Despite cuts, Fort Knox's iconic status endures

FORT KNOX, Ky. (AP) -- Few military posts have a place in pop culture as rock solid as Kentucky's Fort Knox, thanks to its mysterious gold vault.

The name of the historic base is practically synonymous with impenetrability. In addition to housing the Treasury Department's U.S. Bullion Depository and its stacks of gold, the Army's tank training school was started at Fort Knox. And the sprawling central Kentucky Army post has been the setting for blockbuster Hollywood films.

But Knox's days as a war-fighting post may be over with the Pentagon's decision last week to strip its only combat brigade, which follows the loss of its famed armor school and thousands of tank personnel just a few years ago. The base will remain the site of the gold vault, but otherwise it could be destined to function less as a tip-of-the-spear military facility and more as a home to office and support workers.

Many of those workers file into a nearly million-square-foot structure on post that was completed a few years ago, but the massive building doesn't seem destined to unseat the vault as the symbol of Fort Knox.

"It is kind of an icon. Most people when they see the outline of the depository, they know what it is," said Harry Berry, a retired Army lieutenant colonel who is now judge-executive in Hardin County. "When you think about Fort Knox, if you don't have a military background, you instantly think about gold or 'Goldfinger,'" the 1960s James Bond film.

The Pentagon announced last week that it was eliminating Knox's 3rd Brigade Combat Team, 1st Infantry Division as part of a major restructuring that will reduce the Army's active duty combat brigades to 33 from 45. The cuts will reduce the size of the Army from about 570,000 in the midst of the Iraq war down to 490,000, which includes personnel in units that support the brigades.

For some posts, that means the loss of a few hundred soldiers, but in Knox's case it's a cut of more than 40 percent to its active duty force and nearly a total elimination of its fighting personnel. Kentucky Gov. Steve Beshear puts the figure at about 10,000 lost troops and their families leaving Knox and the surrounding area.

Gen. Ray Odierno, Army chief of staff, said the military was not moving toward closing Knox: He pointed out that the Army's recruiting and human resource commands have relocated there since a major Army realignment almost a decade ago.

Baldy Carder, who owns a tattoo parlor in nearby Radcliff, said he's not worried about the post closing ? "because of the gold reserve." But he said his business could take a hit since about half his customers come from the post.

"When you're talking about 10,000 people leaving, that's quite a chunk of change that we're going to be losing," he said.

Fort Knox's own estimates project that its annual economic impact will shrink from about $2.8 billion a year to $2.62 billion upon the brigade's departure, said Ryan Brus with the post's public affairs office. That's a decrease of more than 6 percent.

Much of Knox's future is invested in the home for the Army's Human Resources Command, which opened in 2010. The gleaming structure is the largest office building in Kentucky and one of the biggest in the military.

The work going on inside is a far cry from the military post's heyday when tanks and infantrymen roamed the grassy hills. Knox was known as the home of the Army's tank and armored vehicle training for more than seven decades, before the Pentagon completed the move of the school to Fort Benning, Ga., in 2011.

Lonnie Davis hated to see the tanks go. Aside from the lost business for his Radcliff barber shop, the Kut Zone, he had a 20-year career in the Armored Division at Knox.

"That's why I went into Armor, to stay close to home," Davis said.

Today, the Gen. George S. Patton Museum and a scattering of aging tanks and armored vehicles sprinkled around the post are only remnants of that past.

Inside the museum, which just finished a $5 million renovation, visitors learn about the post's history, and tucked away in a small corner is a tribute to its Hollywood past. That started with "The Tanks Are Coming," a 1951 film about a tank crew fighting its way into German territory. Bill Murray's comedy "Stripes" was released in 1981, with Knox doubling as the fictional Fort Arnold where Murray goes through basic training.

But the most iconic film shot at the post was 1964's "Goldfinger," with Sean Connery in the role as 007, tasked to stop a madman from destroying the country's gold reserves.

The movie helped spur curiosity about Knox's gold vault, which opened in 1937. Its seemingly impregnable walls ushered Fort Knox into the American lexicon as a way to describe a safe and secure location.

During World War II, the gray stone fortress housed documents including the U.S. Constitution and the Declaration of Independence. The U.S. Treasury Department says on its website that there are now 147 million ounces of gold inside, with an estimated worth of more than $160 billion at today's prices.

But the gold stays inside, and the bullion depository is not a tourist attraction: No visitors are allowed in.

Berry and Davis said Knox's future success could depend on adding staff to Human Resources Command along with other administrative-oriented missions. The post's total workforce now is about 20,000, including active duty and civilians.

"We'll gain from that as opposed to the green-suit side, if you will," Berry said.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/despite-cuts-fort-knoxs-iconic-204646658.html

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Britain's economy at a glance

LONDON (AP) ? Here is a look at Britain's economy as Mark Carney becomes Bank of England governor;

STUCK IN A RUT

Britain's $2.3 billion economy ? Europe's third-largest ? has been slow to recover from the global financial crisis as the government cuts spending to control a burgeoning budget deficit. Gross domestic product grew just 0.3 percent in the first quarter of this year after shrinking during the previous three months. The Bank of England has forecast that growth will accelerate to 0.5 percent in the second quarter.

The desultory recovery is threatened by an economic downturn among Britain's European trading partners, which may undermine efforts to rev up exports. Adding more peril, inflation is stuck above the central bank's 2 percent target. Analysts expect it to hit 3.1 percent this summer, partly due to a weaker pound, which makes imports more expensive.

AUSTERITY: WAIT. THERE'S MORE

Prime Minister David Cameron's government instituted an austerity program to make ends meet and shrink the size of the government. The respected Institute for Fiscal studies estimates that 1 million public sector jobs could be lost by 2017-2018. Even so, the deficit remains stubbornly high. The budget deficit was 6.3 percent of GDP in 2012, according to figures from the European Union statistics agency. That was better than 2011's 7.8 percent but is still more than twice the EU limit of 3 percent ? at the same level as that of Cyprus. The IFS says Britain may be facing austerity until 2020.

WHAT TO DO?

The Bank of England slashed interest rates to 0.5 percent and pumped money into the economy. Since 2009, the bank has bought 375 billion pounds ($579 billion) of assets in a stimulus program known as quantitative easing. Some members of the bank's nine-person Monetary Policy Committee, including outgoing Gov. Mervyn King, have argued that stimulus should be increased. Vicki Redwood, an analyst for Capital Economics, has suggested that policymakers were stuck in limbo ahead of Carney's arrival.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/britains-economy-glance-091049198.html

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UK's BSkyB Wins Case Against Microsoft Over Use Of ?SkyDrive? Name In Europe; May Have To Drop Name Or Pay Fines

Microsoft went big on pushing cloud services this week at its Build conference, but today it was dealt a blow for how it might get to market them in Europe. BSkyB, the pay-TV broadcaster part-owned by News Corp., won a judgement in the England and Wales High Court against the U.S. software giant, for infringing the "Sky" trademark.

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Techcrunch/~3/TkcYZuyxFAY/

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Google reveals new London 'groundscraper' HQ

By Tom Bill

LONDON (Reuters) - Google has revealed that its new UK headquarters is a building longer than the Shard skyscraper is tall.

The so-called groundscraper at the King's Cross Central development is the latest overseas property deal by the cash-rich U.S. internet group, which will house all of its London staff under one roof when completed in 2016.

Google revealed designs for the low-rise one million square feet scheme on Friday after announcing its move to King's Cross in January.

At 330 meters long, it exceeds the height of the 310-metre tall Shard, western Europe's tallest skyscraper.

Swiss bank UBS is undertaking a similar large-scale low-rise scheme at the Broadgate complex in London's main financial district.

Several thousand people will work at the site - a large scale operation Google would have found difficult to house in space-constrained central London where land is also more expensive.

Google has spent about 650 million pounds to buy and develop the 2.4 acre site and the finished development will be worth up to one billion pounds, sources told Reuters.

Construction will start early next year subject to planning approval and it will be one of the internet giant's largest offices outside its so-called Googleplex corporate headquarters in Mountain View, California.

The internet giant is a prized tenant for landlords and its presence is expected to draw other technology companies to King's Cross - especially small start-ups - and help bump up rents.

The new site is likely to include a 20,000 square feet area for bike parking, about the size of seven tennis courts, and features a climbing wall between floors, a source close to the project told Reuters.

The company's offices are famous for perks like gourmet food, bowling alleys, roof gardens, high-tech gyms and on-site medical staff and massages.

King's Cross Central, which sits on a former fish, coal and grain goods yard to the north of the city, spans 67 acres and will contain homes, offices and shops. It is being built by the King's Cross Central Limited Partnership which includes developer Argent Group.

Google has traditionally leased its overseas offices but in the past two years has purchased premises in Paris, Dublin, and now London, its filings show.

As of December 31, 2011, Google had $44.6 billion of cash, with $21.2 billion of that held offshore, according to its 2011 annual report. If the funds held offshore were repatriated, they would be subject to U.S. taxes, Google said.

Tax campaigner and accountant Richard Murphy told Reuters at the time of the January announcement that the decision to buy rather than rent was likely "tax motivated", driven by the fact the company cannot repatriate the cash to the U.S. without paying a fat tax bill.

Google declined to comment on the tax issue in relation to its new London building but said such a large-scale investment was a boost to the Britain's economy.

Earlier this month British MPs described Google's tax affairs as "contrived" after a Reuters report showed the company employed staff in sales roles in London, even though it had told MPs in November its British staff were not selling to UK clients - an activity that could boost its tax bill substantially.

(This version of the story was corrected to clarify the staff numbers in sixth paragraph.)

(Editing by David Cowell)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/google-reveals-london-groundscraper-hq-132510940.html

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Android Apps of the Week: WiFiKill Downloader, Imgur, and More

This week was a little light on Android app quantity, but the quality of the ones we do have for you is pretty fantastic. Perhaps not entirely, well, 100% ethical in a certain WiFiKiller's case?but fantastic nonetheless.

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Imgur: Imgur, everyone's favorite super simple image hosting site, finally has an app. And it's certainly taken them long enough. You can do virtually everything you'd be doing on the web: browse images, comment, upload, and manage your account. It's simple, easy, and everything you already love about imgur. [Free]

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WiFiKill Downloader: Although this has the potential to be a dangerous tool in the wrong hands (re: any hands that aren't your own), it can also be an invaluable one if used wisely. Essentially, you'll be holding the power to take away anyone's WiFi on the network you're currently on. So if you're hanging out in a public hotspot and you notice that things seem to be lagging a little more than you'd?er?prefer, you can take matters into your own hands. Just try not to be a jerk. [Free/Pro version with donation]

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Bike Doctor: For the beginning (or even experienced) cyclist, making your own bike repairs can seem like a daunting task. Most bike repair guides you'll find around the ol' internet can be complicated labyrinths of instruction that end up doing more harm than good. But taking your wheels to a pro can come with a major price tag. Bike Doctor wants to give you the knowledge you need to save a trip to the shop?but in an easy, digestible form that's useful to all walks of the bicycle world. [$5]

Source: http://gizmodo.com/android-apps-of-the-week-wifikill-downloader-and-more-613531459

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How 26 Alcoholic Drinks Got Their Names

You drink martinis and manhattans and mint juleps and pina coladas and tom collins and hell, so much more. Have you ever stepped back and wonder how these cocktails were named? Mental Floss' resident genius John Green shares the origin stories of 26 different cocktails so you can learn some. Warning: he's really good at this rapid fire brain melting session. [Mental Floss]

Source: http://gizmodo.com/how-26-alcoholic-drinks-got-their-names-593941924

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Gold's plunge has miners trading as junk | Investing | Financial Post

Barrick Gold Corp. and Kinross Gold Corp. are trading as if they?ve lost their investment-grade ratings after the price of the metal plunged 28 percent this year to the lowest since August 2010.

Barrick?s implied bond rating has deteriorated to Ba1, the highest junk rating, according to Moody?s Corp. Moody?s Investors Service?s actual rating for Toronto-based Barrick, the world?s biggest gold miner, is an investment grade Baa2. Kinross, Canada?s third-largest producer, also has an implied rating of Ba1, versus an actual rating of Baa3.

Barrick Chief Executive Officer Jamie Sokalsky is reducing spending and selling assets as gold heads for its first annual drop since 2000. Barrick, which had $12.5 billion of net debt as of March 31 and sold $3 billion of bonds in April to bolster liquidity, also faces higher costs at its already delayed and over-budget billion-dollar Pascua-Lama gold project in the Andes.

?All the gold names have been pretty much getting hammered both on the credit side and the equity side for quite some time with gold prices coming down,? Wen Li, an analyst at CreditSights Inc., said in a phone interview yesterday. Pascua- Lama is also a ?really big overhang? for Barrick, he said.

Barrick?s bonds have declined 12 percent since May 1, the fourth-biggest drop among issuers in Bank of America Merrill Lynch?s U.S. Metals, Mining and Steel Index. Goldcorp Inc.?s securities have lost 9.4 percent and Kinross?s by 7 percent, according to Bank of America Merrill Lynch index data. The largest 50 issuers in the index have lost an average 9 percent.

?If all currently planned projects go forward, and current metals prices and financial policies continue, the simple math results in inevitable pressure on credit metrics and ratings? in the industry, said Kevin McSweeney, portfolio manager at CI Investments Inc., which oversees about $74 billion of assets.

Gold futures in New York yesterday dropped below $1,200 for the first time since August 2010, as signs of improving U.S. economic growth boosted speculation the Federal Reserve will wind down its asset-purchase program. After rising to a record $1,923.70 an ounce in September 2011, gold futures for August delivery fell 1.6 percent to $1,192.20 at 8:47 a.m. today on the Comex in New York.

?Our investment grade rating was recently reconfirmed by all three rating agencies, with Moody?s re-confirming a Baa3 rating just earlier this month,? Steve Mitchell, a spokesman for Toronto-based Kinross, said yesterday by e-mail.

Barrick has the lowest operating costs of the senior producers and nearly 60 percent of its production in the first quarter came from five mines at a cost of $591 per ounce, said Andy Lloyd, a company spokesman.

?Our debt repayment obligations in the next few years are modest, with the majority maturing beyond 2023,? Lloyd said in an e-mail yesterday.

Jeff Wilhoit, a spokesman for Vancouver-based Goldcorp, didn?t respond to phone calls and an e-mail yesterday seeking comment on the bonds? performance.

High-yield, or junk bonds, are rated below Baa3 by Moody?s Investors Service and lower than BBB- at Standard & Poor?s.

Elsewhere in credit markets, Valeant Pharmaceuticals International Inc. issued $3.23 billion yesterday of junk bonds to finance its buyout of eye-care provider Bausch & Lomb Holdings Inc. last month.

The Laval, Quebec-based company also is planning $4.05 billion in loans to help fund the purchase. Valeant issued $1.63 billion of eight-year securities yielding 7.5 percent and $1.6 billion of five-year notes with a yield of 6.75 percent.

The extra yield investors demand to own the debt of Canadian investment-grade corporations rather than the federal government was unchanged at 124 basis points yesterday from a day earlier, according to a Bank of America Merrill Lynch index. Yields fell to 3.18 percent from 3.22 percent.

In the provincial bond market, relative yields were unchanged at 72 basis points yesterday, according to another Bank of America Merrill Lynch index. Yields dropped to 2.91 percent, from 2.96 percent.

Corporate debt has lost 0.4 percent this year, Bank of America Merrill Lynch index data show. Provincial securities have slid 2.6 percent, and federal-government bonds have dropped 2.1 percent.

The relative yield investors demand to hold Barrick?s bonds have surged to an average 332 basis points from 224 basis points on May 1, according to Bank of America Merrill Lynch. The company?s credit default swaps have implied a speculative grade rating of Ba1, the highest junk rating, since mid-April and over the last two days dropped to as low as Ba3, according to Moody?s data.

Barrick could face a ratings downgrade of ?another notch or so? if gold prices continue to decline and stay lower for a prolonged period, although it will probably remain investment grade, said Li.

?They will get hit pretty hard in terms of earnings and margins and free cash flow? at lower prices, he said.

Barrick has forecast it will cost $950 to $1,050 to produce an ounce of gold on average from all its mines this year. Goldcorp forecast a cost of $1,000 to $1,100.

Barrick?s net debt would probably increase to a peak of $15.8 billion in 2014 if it decides to cancel its Pascua-Lama project, assuming a gold price of $1,300, Anita Soni, a Toronto- based analyst at Credit Suisse Group AG, said in a note dated June 25. Net debt could rise to $17 billion in 2015 if the project on the Chile-Argentina border goes ahead.

Repayment becomes a concern with gold under $1,300, though only in the longer term because the company has good access to the debt market and $14 billion of its $17.7 billion gross debt is due in 2018 or later, she said.

Barrick had $2.34 billion in cash and equivalents as of March 31, according to data compiled by Bloomberg, and said May 2 it completed the sale of $3 billion of 5-, 10- and 30-year notes. The company also had undrawn credit of $2 billion, Chief Financial Officer Ammar Al-Joundi said on an April 24 conference call. The company?s cumulative debt repayment obligations through 2017 were less than its operating cash flow last year, he said.

Barrick, which last year raised the cost estimate for Pascua-Lama to as much as $8.5 billion, said June 3 that production won?t start in the second half of 2014 as planned, because of demands from Chile?s environmental agency, and that the delay would probably lead to higher capital costs.

Barrick will probably re-evaluate its capital spending plans in light of the current gold price, which may help reduce its financing burden, Joel Levington, managing director of corporate credit research at Brookfield Investment Management Inc. in New York, said in an e-mail.

?Barrick will be able to maintain investment-grade ratings, but a downgrade to low-BBB would not be surprising,? he said.

Bloomberg.com

Source: http://business.financialpost.com/2013/06/28/golds-plunge-has-miners-trading-as-junk/

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Deal of the Day: 36% off the Incipio Frequency Semi Rigid Soft Shell Case for iPhone 5

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Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/TheIphoneBlog/~3/DjGrIidl98A/story01.htm

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Archaeologists unearth Tuscaloosa's early history

June 26, 2013 ? University of Alabama archaeologists are getting a glimpse of what life in Tuscaloosa might have been like more than 180 years ago. From bottles and porcelain pieces to soil and flotation samples taken from privies, or outhouses, the analysts are discovering many "stories" of Tuscaloosa's past.

For the past two months, UA's Office of Archaeological Research has been analyzing artifacts found at the former City Fest lot, located on the corner of University Boulevard and Greensboro Avenue. The University was contracted by the City of Tuscaloosa to perform an archaeological investigation per federal guidelines in preparation for construction of a new Embassy Suites hotel.

Beginning in January, project director Brandon Thompson and his team began investigating the "Bank of the State site." In February, they stripped the remaining parking lot and exposed some "incredible" features, including many foundation remains from buildings that date back to before 1820, said Matt Gage, director of the Office of Archaeological Research.

Initial occupation of the site dates to 1816 when Revolutionary War veteran John Click built a log cabin on the property. However, he never got a deed to the property and lost it to John McKee in 1823. McKee was the Cherokee, Chickasaw and Choctaw agent at the time, as well as a land surveyor, and he had helped lay out the city of Tuscaloosa, Gage said.

Over the years, the property was home to numerous businesses, including Augustin Lynch's cabinet manufactory. Known as one of the most important Antebellum furniture makers of the time, Gage said Lynch provided furniture for the Capitol building -- at the time located only a few blocks to the west -- and for some of the early University of Alabama buildings.

He also created ivory billiard balls and sold them to people in Washington, D.C. Gage said they discovered ivory on the site, as well as rusted tools such as saw blades and drills.

The Bank of the State was built on the property in 1829, and Gage said they found some beautiful decorative pieces from that building, as well as a few Spanish coins. The coins are reales minted in Brazil, Guatemala City and Mexico City. The coins were found in pits containing British gun flints and early bottles closer to where Click's log cabin had been, so Gage predicted they were either associated with traders coming through Tuscaloosa or early dealings with the Bank of the State.

"In the early 1800s, foreign currency was used as frequently as coinage minted in the country," he said. "There were so few mints in the U.S. at the time, any currency of monetary value made of gold, silver or copper was given value and could be exchanged as easily as currency minted in the U.S."

The property also housed an ice factory, numerous shanties and other dwellings, a hotel and the Drish building, which was initially used as a warehouse and then a Civil War prisoner-of-war facility. Artifacts discovered included various bottles (including those that held food, as well as drink and medicine), buttons, porcelain pieces, printing press letters, early smoking pipes, architectural elements from the buildings and more.

A gold mine for archaeologists when it comes to historical sites are wells and privies, said Gage, and they found several on this site, including some that had been used by the Union soldiers housed at the Civil War prison. Using soil and flotation samples from the privies, analysts can determine everything from what individuals were eating to how they were being treated, he added.

"It's just a wealth of information," Gage said.

"Tuscaloosa has a very rich history. When you think of the early history of Tuscaloosa, even though the state capitol was here, you still figure that it was a small little enclave, people going about their lives with a predominant lifestyle involving agriculture, but commerce is a major aspect of this block," Gage said.

"There are so many elements of this site that provide a fantastic glimpse of the past and knowing that past is incredibly important. You can never know who or what you are without knowing your history."

Source: http://feeds.sciencedaily.com/~r/sciencedaily/top_news/top_environment/~3/ZyVP4IbLVDc/130626153902.htm

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Financier Marc Rich dies in Switzerland

GENEVA (AP) ? Marc Rich, the trader known as the "King of Commodities" whose controversial 2001 pardon by President Bill Clinton just hours before he left office unleashed a political firestorm of criticism in 2001, died on Wednesday. He was 78.

Rich died in Switzerland, where he lived, according to his Israel-based spokesman Avner Azulay. He did not give further details, but said Rich would be buried in Israel on Thursday.

Rich fled from the United States to Switzerland in 1983 after he was indicted by a U.S. federal grand jury on more than 50 counts of fraud, racketeering, trading with Iran during the U.S. Embassy hostage crisis and evading more than US$48 million in income taxes ? crimes that could have earned him more than 300 years in prison.

Rich remained on the FBI's Most Wanted List, narrowly escaping capture in Finland, Germany, Britain and Jamaica, until Clinton granted him a pardon on Jan. 20, 2001 ? the day he handed over the keys to the White House to George W. Bush.

Rich's pardon catapulted him into the headlines once again.

According to Federal Election Commission records, Rich's ex-wife, songwriter Denise Rich, gave US$201,000 in political donations to the Democratic Party in 2000 as lawyers for the fugitive financier pressed the U.S. government to drop the case. Rich's attorneys turned to Clinton when the Justice Department refused to negotiate.

Federal authorities investigated but found no evidence of wrongdoing, while election officials also dismissed a complaint accusing Denise Rich of donating campaign money and furniture to Hillary Clinton in exchange for the pardon. Bill Clinton also denied any wrongdoing and said he acted on advice by prominent legal experts not connected to the trader.

Switzerland, which had different tax laws and, as a neutral country, had no embargo against Iran refused to treat Rich ? a billionaire trader in oil, metals and other commodities ? as a criminal or hand him over to the United States despite strong diplomatic pressure.

"In our business we're not political," Rich said in a rare 1992 interview with NBC. "That's just the philosophy of our company."

Rich was born in Antwerp, Belgium, on Dec. 18, 1934. His Jewish family fled from the Nazis to the United States, where Rich went to school and college in New York.

After dropping out of college, Rich went to work for the commodity traders Phillips Brothers, now called Phibro, in New York. He quickly got the knack of trading and in 1967 was sent by the company to work in Madrid, where he met Pincus "Pinky" Green, his future partner.

In 1973, Rich and Green left the company after arguing over the size of their bonuses. They set up Marc Rich and Co., based in the Swiss town of Zug, whose low taxes have made it one of the world's oil trading centers.

Business boomed. Rich specialized in acting as a middle man for purchases in global trouble spots ? such as Iran, apartheid-era South Africa or Cuba and Libya during U.S. trade embargoes.

Rich and Green were the first traders to use short-term purchases, now known as the spot market, to make big money, quickly. Buying large volumes when the price was low, they were able to control the market when prices rose.

In 1983, Rich fled to Switzerland to escape charges against him. In his absence, Rich's companies pleaded guilty to the charges, paying fines of about US$130 million.

"The question is, was there crime, and I'm saying I don't think so," Rich told NBC, adding that as Marc Rich and Co. was a Swiss company, it was legal for the firm to do business with Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini's Iran.

Swiss authorities did not consider his alleged crimes grounds for extradition.

Rich worked on making himself popular by becoming a major philanthropist, giving money to the arts and charities in the hope of building good contacts and guarding against extradition. He renounced his U.S. citizenship and became a citizen both of Israel and Spain.

But he earned the hatred of U.S. labor unions during the 1990-92 Ravenswood Aluminum Corp. strike in West Virginia.

His company was a part-owner of Ravenswood Aluminum, whose workers accused Rich of locking 1,500 steelworkers out of the plant when their contract expired and hiring replacement workers without negotiating.

The union won the 20-month labor battle, but not before union members picketed outside Rich's Swiss offices.

Rich had married the former Denise Eisenberg, a New York socialite, in 1966. They divorced in 1992. After that she contributed US$450,000 to Clinton's presidential library foundation and more than US$100,000 to Hillary Clinton's Senate campaign.

In 1993, Rich sold his own company ? which was then renamed Glencore, now the world's largest commodity trader ? and set up a new firm, Marc Rich and Co. Holding, also based in Zug.

Although a Russian firm, Crown Resources, tried to buy its commodities unit in 2001, the buyout fell through and Rich remained active in the trading business.

After spending several years in Zug, Rich moved to "La Villa Rose" on the shores of Lake Lucerne in nearby Meggen. He also owned property in the swish ski resort of St. Moritz and in Marbella, on the south coast of Spain.

Rich married again, to German-born Gisela Rossi, in 1998. They divorced in 2005. Rich had two daughters, Ilona Rich Schachter and Danielle Rich Kilstock.

___

Ian Deitch in Jerusalem and Geir Moulson in Berlin contributed to this report.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/financier-marc-rich-dies-switzerland-094009342.html

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Feds sue ex-NJ governor Corzine over MF Global failure

mf-global

Staff reports CNBC.com

1 hour ago

JONATHAN ERNST / Reuters

Former MF Global CEO Jon Corzine testifies before a House Financial Services Committee Oversight and Investigations Subcommittee hearing on the collapse of MF Global, at the U.S. Capitol in Washington in this December 15, 2011 file photo.

The Commodity Futures Trading Commission is suing former MF Global CEO Jon Corzine for failure to supervise at the defunct firm.

In a statement, the regulator said it seeks to ban the former governor of New Jersey from working in the futures industry for his alleged role in the firm's bankruptcy 18 months ago.

The suit also targets the former treasurer of the company, Edith O'Brien, and alleges that MF Global misused funds prior to its collapse. The CFTC is asking for a $100 million penalty against the company.

MF Global collapsed in October 2011 under the weight of aggressive bets on sovereign debt, thin capital and questionable disclosures to investors. Customers were left reeling after it was revealed that more than $1 billion of their money could not be found.

Corzine is charged with violating his legal obligations to diligently supervise. O'Brien is charged with aiding and abetting the firm's misuse of customer funds.

Reuters contributed to this report.

Source: http://feeds.nbcnews.com/c/35002/f/663286/s/2de407d7/l/0L0Snbcnews0N0Cbusiness0Cfeds0Esue0Eex0Enj0Egovernor0Ecorzine0Eover0Emf0Eglobal0Efailure0E6C10A472546/story01.htm

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Supreme Court 2013: The Year in Review

Justice Samuel Alito's ruling in the Baby Veronica case may point the way to the court striking down other American Indian classifications in the law.

Photo by Jason Reed/Reuters

Emily, you present Adoptive Couple v. Baby Girl as a Solomonic tussle between the biological father of Baby Veronica and her adoptive parents. Both sides possess strong claims to parental rights, and the only thing to do is think deeply about what is in the best interest of the child, and resolve the case accordingly. That is not how I read the opinion. When a statute is as ambiguous as this one is, and the court breaks down along ideological lines (as the court nearly does?with Scalia and Breyer switching places, as is becoming increasingly common), a good place to start is with the ideological underpinnings of the case. Appearances to the contrary, the case is not about the relative interests of biological parents versus adoptive parents?an issue which has little ideological valence these days. It is about race and racial classifications.

The issue in this case is whether a biological Indian father must have had custody of his child in order to have the right to stop the biological mother from putting the child up for adoption with a non-Indian family. The majority said yes, ruling against the father. Justice Alito argued that if the father did not have custody, then maybe he has not made a significant investment in the child, and thus the adoption may seem to be presumptively in the best interest of the child, despite our usual assumption that children should normally stay with their biological parents.

But the statute in question, The Indian Child Welfare Act, was enacted in 1978 by a Democratic Congress and president to preserve the integrity of Indian tribes. Congress passed the statute specifically to keep intact Indian tribes that were losing members as children were adopted by non-Indian couples. The statute thus grants a special right to Indian parents that non-Indian parents (in many states, including South Carolina, where the events took place) lack. The statute directs courts not to act in the best interests of the child when they conflict with legitimate tribal interests.

Justice Sotomayor, writing in dissent, is correct that the statute thus favors the father. The crux of the majority opinion is this sentence: The dissent?s interpretation ?would put certain vulnerable children at a great disadvantage solely because an ancestor?even a remote one?was an Indian.? Baby Veronica was only 3/256 Cherokee, a fact that Justice Alito repeats (and Justice Sotomayor scolds him for repeating). The Cherokee use a kind of ?one-drop? rule to maximize their membership and to maximize the rights of their members. Even if Baby Veronica would do best with the adoptive parents, and even if she is not really Indian in a racial sense, she must be sent back to the Indian tribe in order to advance the cause of Indian tribal unity. In Alito?s view, this can?t be the right outcome.

Justice Sotomayor accuses the majority of reading its policy preferences into the statute, and maybe it does. But larger issues are at stake. What sticks in Alito?s craw (or so I conjecture) is that here is Congress using an explicit racial classification to advance the interests of a minority?exactly like affirmative action. And most of the members of the conservative majority believe that the equal protection clause bans such racial preferences. Equal protection is the animating motive of Alito?s opinion.

Rather than say this, Alito says that the dissent?s interpretation ?would raise equal protection concerns,? but they needn?t be addressed because the statute is clear. Why does he pretend that an obviously ambiguous statute is clear? The answer is that there is no precedent for applying the equal protection clause to strike down Indian classifications, which are ubiquitous in the law. Justice Sotomayor makes just this point: ?The majority?s repeated, analytically unnecessary references to the fact that Baby Girl is 3/256 Cherokee by ancestry do nothing to elucidate its intimation that the statute may violate the Equal Protection Clause as applied here.? So the majority has laid the groundwork for a future equal protection challenge to Indian classifications and fortified its position that the equal protection clause bans racial preferences like affirmative action. Interesting that no one noticed.

Source: http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/the_breakfast_table/features/2013/supreme_court_2013/baby_veronica_indian_adoption_and_the_supreme_court_justice_alito_s_ruling.html

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'Titanfall' developer explains why the game won't be on PS4, and the ...

The next-gen mech shooter Titanfall would not be possible without Microsoft?s Xbox One cloud services, according to Respawn Entertainment engineer Jon Shiring. The cloud is tied into Microsoft?s controversial online policies for the new console, and it?s been the subject of confusion and ire from gamers. Shiring took to?Respawn?s blog?to explain the benefits from a developer?s perspective.

According to Shiring, Microsoft?s dedicated servers are the perfect solution to a long-standing problem. Console games with online multiplayer aspects typically use player-hosted servers because dedicated servers are expensive and tough to implement, but dedicated servers offer a superior experience. Microsoft?s dedicated cloud servers allow Respawn to implement more and better AI, physics, and environments, eliminate the ?host advantage? that plagues many online games, thwart some forms of cheating, boost matchmaking speeds, eliminate the need to pause the game when the host player quits, and improve visuals and audio by taking full advantage of the console hardware and leaving other tasks to the cloud processors.

The cloud services aren?t limited to Xbox One games either, and Respawn uses them for the Windows PC and Xbox 360 versions of?Titanfall as well. Respawn approached both Sony and Microsoft about this problem, and Microsoft was the one to implement a solution, Shiring writes.

?Microsoft realized that player-hosted servers are actually holding back online gaming and that this is something that they could help solve, and ran full-speed with this idea,? he writes. ?So they built this powerful system to let us create all sorts of tasks that they will run for us, and it can scale up and down automatically as players come and go.?

?We?want to focus on making awesome games, not on becoming giant worldwide server hosting providers,? he continues. ?The more time I can spend on making our actual game better, the more our players benefit.?

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Source: http://www.digitaltrends.com/gaming/titanfall-developers-spell-out-benefits-of-xbox-one-cloud/

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Star is crowded by super-Earths

25 June 2013 Last updated at 09:18 ET By Jonathan Amos Science correspondent, BBC News

Scientists have identified three new planets around a star they already suspected hosted a trio of worlds.

It means this relatively nearby star, Gliese 667C, now has three so-called super-Earths orbiting in its "habitable zone".

This is the region where temperatures ought to allow for the possibility of liquid water, although no-one can say for sure what conditions are really like on these planets.

Gliese 667C is 22 light-years away.

Astronomers can see it on the sky in the constellation of Scorpius (The Scorpion).

Previous studies of Gliese 667C had established there were very probably three planets around it, with its habitable zone occupied by one super-Earth - an object slightly bigger than our home world, but very probably with a rocky surface.

Now, a team of astronomers led by Guillem Anglada-Escude of the University of G?ttingen, Germany, and Mikko Tuomi, of the University of Hertfordshire, UK, has re-examined the system and raised the star's complement of planets.

The researchers used a suite of telescopes including the 3.6m telescope at the Silla Observatory in Chile. This incorporates the high-precision Harps instrument. Harps employs an indirect method of detection that infers the existence of orbiting planets from the way their gravity makes a parent star appear to twitch in its motion across the sky.

Full to bursting

The planets' presence needs to be disentangled from this complex signal but the Harps instrument is recognised as having tremendous success in identifying smaller worlds.

Gliese 667C is a low-luminosity "M-dwarf" star just over one-third the mass of our Sun.

This means its habitable zone can be much closer in before temperatures make liquid water impossible. The team is now confident that three rocky worlds occupy this region at Gilese 667C.

"Their estimated masses range from 2.7 to 3.8 that of the Earth's," Mikko Tuomi told BBC News.

"However, we can only estimate the physical sizes by assuming certain compositions that is, well, only educated guessing.

"Their orbital periods are 28, 39, and 62 days, which means that they all orbit the star closer to its surface than Mercury in our own system. Yet, the estimated surface temperatures enable the existence of liquid water on them because of the low luminosity and low mass of the star."

These planets are said to completely fill the habitable zone. There are no more stable orbits in which to fit another planet.

That said, the team has found tantalising evidence for what may be another rocky world on the inner-edge of the zone.

Fruitful targets

The planets would need an atmosphere to sustain liquid water on their surfaces, but at a distance of more than 200 trillion km, there are no means currently to determine what the precise conditions are like or whether life would have any chance of establishing itself.

Nonetheless, Dr Tuomi believes M-dwarf stars are good candidates to go hunting for potentially habitable worlds.

They a small enough that close-in rocky planets will show up well in the Harps Doppler spectroscopy data, but they are also dim enough that those close-orbiting worlds will not be roasted.

"This discovery single-handedly demonstrates that low-mass stars can be hosts of several potentially habitable planets," explained Dr Tuomi.

"In practice, it means that we might have to double or treble our estimates for the occurrence rate of habitable-zone planets around M-dwarf stars.

"There might, in fact, be more habitable-zone planets in the Universe than there are stars, which makes it much easier for the future space missions to obtain images of these planets.

"So, although only a rather simple discovery, its implications might force us to re-think how common habitable-zone planets are in the Universe."

Jonathan.Amos-INTERNET@bbc.co.uk and follow me on Twitter: @BBCAmos

Source: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-23032467#sa-ns_mchannel=rss&ns_source=PublicRSS20-sa

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Mobile Online Casino, Convenience Maximized | Tech on the Go ...

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Source: http://www.techonthego.co.uk/2013/06/mobile-online-casino-convenience-maximized-13836

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BlackBerry releases Secure Work Space for iOS and Android (video)

Paranoid corporate types living in fear of bring-your-own-device employees can soon relax: BlackBerry has just launched its Secure Work Space app, right on schedule. It'll allow organizations to manage and secure Google and Apple devices through BlackBerry Enterprise Service (BES) 10, which forms the mobile backbone of many a company's internal network. By using it, personnel without BlackBerry devices like the Z10 or Q10 will gain a way to check their company's calendars, email and organizers without fear of snooping. At the same time, IT types will be able to securely see, manage and update all Android and Apple devices network-wide. For its part, the Waterloo outfit should gain another source of revenue through the software (which consists of a suite of apps and BES 10.1 update), even with companies that haven't invested in its devices. For more info about the software or to grab a trial, check the source.

Filed under: Cellphones, Software, Mobile, Blackberry

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Via: Reuters

Source: Blackberry

Source: http://www.engadget.com/2013/06/25/blackberry-launches-secure-work-space-for-ios-and-android/?utm_medium=feed&utm_source=Feed_Classic&utm_campaign=Engadget

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KKR to buy clinical trials firm PRA International

(Reuters) - Funds managed by KKR & Co LP will buy clinical research group PRA International from Genstar Capital LLC for an undisclosed amount, PRA said on Monday, underscoring growing private equity interest in the contract research industry.

Terms of the deal were not disclosed, but a person familiar with the matter said the agreed price was around $1.3 billion, as previously reported by Reuters.

"Over the past several years, we have witnessed a dramatic increase in M&A within the pharma services industry, with 17 moderate-to-large deals occurring over the past four years," Sterne Agee analyst Greg Bolan said in a research note.

Clinical research service firms are either being snapped up by private equity firms willing to pay top dollar or are being taken public in offerings that attract strong investor demand in a bet that the pharmaceutical industry, for cost reasons, will continue to outsource the research needed to get drugs approved by regulators.

Genstar bought PRA in 2007 for $797 million and put it on the block earlier this year after failing to sell it in 2011.

The San Francisco-based private equity firm filed for an IPO for PRA in May, which given the strong equity markets helped make the sales process more competitive, said Mike Gerardi, managing director, healthcare investment banking, at Jefferies LLC, PRA's financial adviser.

The market is now more generous toward such companies. Last month, Bain Capital LLC and TPG Capital LP raised $947 million by taking public Quintiles Transnational Holdings, the world's largest provider of contract research services.

"I consider the IPO market as another bidder ... and a pretty robust one," Gerardi said.

PRA provides clinical trial services and other research for pharmaceutical companies in more than 80 countries to help them win regulatory approval for drugs.

For KKR, PRA marks its second healthcare investment over the past 12 months. In June 2012, the private equity firm announced an investment in GenesisCare, an Australia-wide network of cancer and cardiovascular care centers. Since 1995, KKR has invested more than $9 billion in healthcare globally.

Latham & Watkins was legal adviser To PRA. Credit Suisse, UBS Investment Bank and Wells Fargo were financial advisers to KKR, while Simpson Thacher & Bartlett LLP was legal adviser.

(Reporting by Greg Roumeliotis and Jessica Toonkel in New York and Arpita Mukherjee in Bangalore; Editing by Ted Kerr and Steve Orlofsky)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/kkr-funds-buy-clinical-trial-firm-pra-international-123355444.html

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Dreams turn bitter for Bangladeshi garment workers

TEKANI, Bangladesh (AP) ? Moushumi's family now has one of the largest homes in their village ? two bedrooms plus a living area with walls made of sturdy brick. Her father and brother will soon have a small business out front, selling furniture her dad will make. There will be money to pay for her younger sister to get married when it's time.

It is the dream of nearly every Bangladeshi garment worker to earn enough money to build such a life back in their village. Yet for most it remains just that: Wages are so low they can find themselves struggling to eat, let alone save.

And in the case of Moushumi's family, the dream has been bitterly corrupted, made possible not by the opportunity the garment industry provided, but by the tragedy it inflicted.

Moushimi, who like many people in Bangladesh used only one name, was just 18 when she was killed along with 111 others trapped behind the locked gates of the Tazreen garment factory when it burned last November. Her family renovated their home using the 600,000 takas ($7,700) they received in compensation.

A fortune in a poor village like Tekani in Bangladesh's far northwest, it is one the family would gladly return tomorrow to have Moushumi back.

"Previously we didn't have money but we had peace in our mind. We had a complete family," said her mother, Hawa Begum. "The peace is no longer there."

Since the fire and April's collapse of the Rana Plaza factory building, which killed 1,129 people, Bangladesh's garment industry has been under increased pressure from workers and activists to raise wages and improve working conditions.

The government agreed last month to set up a committee to look into raising the minimum wage of $38 a month. Rather than talking of luxuries like buying land, those advocating for higher salaries speak of getting enough calories. They say the current rate isn't close to what workers need to pay their bills and eat properly.

"It's not enough for their half a month's costs even," said Kalpona Akter, a former garment worker and the executive director of the Bangladesh Center for Workers Solidarity in Dhaka. Most in the industry are "living just hand-to-mouth," she said.

Rubel, 20, left the Tekani area more than two years ago, drawn by the prospect of steady garment work and the ability to save. Even after a raise, he couldn't get by on his salary. Adding to his woes, he was often paid late and was sometimes cheated out of overtime. He found himself buying food on credit.

"I couldn't keep my word with the shopkeepers and they would get angry with me," he said. "It would make me sad to not be able to keep my word."

He gave up after six months and returned home.

"When I went there I thought of saving money, coming back, building a home and taking care of my family," he said. "But it didn't happen."

Three years ago, 22-year-old Mosammat Angura Begum and her husband left Tekani for garment work in a Dhaka suburb more than 300 kilometers away.

Their combined salary of about 10,000 takas ($128) goes quickly, for rent, utilities, food and household goods. On a good month they can save 2,500 takas ($32), sending some back to Tekani to help care for their daughter and saving the rest. Still, they don't know how long they can endure.

"Age is an issue. Now I get through the day by skipping one meal, no problem. But what will happen when I get old? Will I be able to do that?" Angura asked.

Most garment workers expect too much when they enter the industry, said Nur Alom, the elected local chairman for Tekani and the surrounding villages. He said it's rare for a worker to save enough to buy land or build a house. Realistically, they can purchase some cattle for their family.

Villagers say saving is difficult if only one or two people from the family go to work in the factories, but if four or five family members do it, it is possible.

While success stories are rare, they do exist. Rabiul Islam was recently back in Tekani overseeing the workers replacing his family's mud house with a brick one.

He started in the industry 14 years ago, making 700 takas ($9) a month. He kept getting promotions and changing jobs until he reached as high up the chain as a common worker can, making 34,000 takas ($345) a month as a factory production manager.

"I worked hard," he said. "Now it's paying off."

Moushumi had goals of her own when she and her mother, Hawa, left for the factories.

"We wanted to learn this work so we could return and buy machines and work from home," Hawa said. They also hoped to save enough to pay Moushumi's eventual dowry.

In less than a year in the industry, the mother and daughter were employed at two other factories before they found work in Tazreen. They had been on the job just 10 days when the fire broke out. Hawa was on the fifth floor; Moushumi was on the fourth.

"When we heard of a fire downstairs, we started running for the stairs, but the gates were locked," Hawa recalled. "The supervisor said it was nothing and if there is a fire, they will let us know."

Her thoughts turned to Moushumi.

"I tried to go to my daughter, but there was no way," she said. "The gates on each floor were locked. There was smoke everywhere."

Her colleagues broke through a window housing an exhaust fan and started jumping to the ground far below.

"I stuck my head out and someone pushed me through," Hawa said.

She woke up in the hospital with a broken leg and collarbone and injuries to her spine. She can walk now with a crutch, but requires monthly trips to Dhaka for medical treatment that are cutting into the 150,000 takas ($1,925) she received for her injuries.

Moushumi is buried in a simple grave in a clearing a short walk from the house her death helped build. The family gathers there each Friday to pray that she has found peace.

As garment workers, she and her mother had been able to save 3,500 takas ($45) on a good month. At that rate, they would have needed to work in factories for nearly 18 years to make as much as the family was paid in compensation for Moushimi's death.

___

Associated Press writer Julhas Alam contributed to this report.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/dreams-turn-bitter-bangladeshi-garment-workers-064528965.html

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Speed And Automating The Connections Between Humans And Machines In The API Economy

This coming Friday night, I?ll be at the API Days conference in San Francisco to talk for a few minutes about my perspectives of the API economy.?I am not a developer -- just an observer -- so my views are not deeply technical. That just means I have to ask more questions and talk to more people about APIs and what they represent.

But then I have to simmer it down, collect my thoughts, and then ask some more questions. Here are two themes I am picking up on from all these conversations.

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Techcrunch/~3/e2nohq_UPWw/

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White House threatens veto of House farm bill (The Arizona Republic)

Share With Friends: | | Politics - Top Stories News, RSS and RSS Feed via Feedzilla.

Source: http://news.feedzilla.com/en_us/stories/politics/top-stories/313379360?client_source=feed&format=rss

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Are 1/3 of Travelers ignored? - The Traveling Fool

photo via Flickr Klearchos Kapoutsis

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If you owned a business and knew that 1/3 of your customers spent the majority of money with you why would you take them for granted?

Research shows that in the US alone, more than 76 million babies were born between 1946 and 1964.

The baby boomer generation as it is called represents 36 percent of leisure travelers and 43 percent of business travelers. Boomer travel also makes up 80 percent of the luxury travel market. {{Taken from http://www.ustravel.org/news/press-kit/travel-facts-and-statistics}}That?s a pretty large market!

There are some magazines and agencies that specialize in boomer travel but for the most part this segment of travelers is ignored. While thoughts of grey haired people playing shuffle board may come to mind you have to remember that this group was the Woodstock group, the internet startup group and the group that was at the beginning of the tech revolution. The boomers of today were the original backpack across Europe crowd, and the ones that made visiting places like Tibet and Tunisia fashionable. This is the group that has always been adventurous, innovative and took risks so when it comes to travel they are breaking the mold of what most people think of when it comes to senior travel.

If you have stayed at a hostel, been on an adventure tour, went hiking or biking chances are you have met some old guys and gals. Hey I can talk I am one of them.

Now I want to explain something. There is a difference between catering to boomers and not ignoring them. The industry does not need to turn upside down and serve nothing but boomer travel. This is the first time I have ever written specifically about baby boomers. But as part of a marketing plan you have to take into consideration the number of people involved and make sure you are not alienating them.

Research conducted by Baby Boomer magazine shows 54% wanting to travel more regularly and to long-haul destinations and 22% wanting to go on a once in a lifetime holiday in the next decade. Over 11% of Baby Boomers over 50 plan on traveling on their own, and we are not talking just RV trips or hitting the slots at Vegas. Boomers want to see foreign countries, go on adventures and start checking of items on bucket lists.

These aren?t the grandparents from the fifties. Places like Antarctica, Machu Pichu, Amazon River tours and hiking Europe are on these bucket lists, even clothing optional cruises and resorts.? Yeah I know??..eeew! Trust me I don?t want to see me most of time much less some others. However remember Vanessa Williams, Paula Abdul, Jamie Lee Curtis, George Clooney, Tom Hanks and even Vladimir Putin are all baby boomers. I may have to reconsider should Valerie Bertinelli or Michelle Pfeiffer ever go sans clothes at a resort.

Here are some things for the travel industry to consider.

1 Boomers as a whole have more time to spend on travel and leisure.

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2 Boomers usually want a little more comfort having done the poor traveler routine when younger. This does not mean only staying at high end hotels and resorts. It does mean things like hostels with private rooms not a dorm of bunk beds. Comfortable beds, access to wi-fi, not having to carry luggage up six flights of stairs and safety, to include in room safes. These are the things that we never thought that much about when younger but it is important now. Not being crammed in a small economy seat on a 13 hour flight is a big plus. So maybe a little leg room please?

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3 Boomers still do most if not all the things they did when younger, river rafting and tours, sky diving, scuba and everything in between. However willing the mind is, a day packed with a hike, river rafting, zip line and four wheeler in a 10 hour period, might put a lot of us down for the next day or two. So spread out the activities and give the option of one or more stand alone activities instead of a take it all or leave it package.

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4 Boomers are more likely to have done their homework and looked online to check out hotel, airline and restaurant reviews. They want the adventure and visiting the out of the way places but still have some type of comfort.

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5 Boomers are still into the night life. Yes a quiet piano bar attracts a certain crowd as does a raging, ear blasting, spring break blowout. That doesn?t mean us old folks don?t like something in between. Go to an Aerosmith concert and you will find people in their 40?s and 50?s.

So Travel Industry, listen up. When you market, write an ad, do a story, offer a press trip, or set up your facilities do it with everyone in mind. The 20 year old that is traveling around the world and the 50 year old backpacking couple can co-exist in the same place enjoy each other?s company and are interested in a lot of the same things.

I am still interested in seeing out of the way places, walking around cities, hitting the night life and experiencing things for the first time.

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Source: http://www.thetravellingfool.com/are-13-of-travelers-ignored/

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Download Satellite Communication PDF Ebook Free - Applied ...

Download Satellite Communication, 4th edition, by Dennis Roddy Ebook Free. This book covers broad sector of Satellite Communication from transmitter, receivers, Geo stationary orbit,?the earth segment, the satellite part, transmitter and receiver design, antenna design(see CST Studio download to design antenna), polarization, radio wave propagation interference, link budget, coding and decoding of data such as turbo codes, BCH etc.

Download Link:

http://filepost.com/files/842ad6d4/satcomm.pdf/

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Source: http://appliedelectronicsengineering.blogspot.com/2013/06/download-satellite-communication-pdf.html

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