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How Did This Crazy Deficit Happen?

Andrew Price
08.28.09

News outlets are picking up on the latest CBO report that estimates the 2009 budget deficit is going to hit $1.6 trillion. That's the biggest single-year shortfall since WWII.Back in 2001, the CBO thought we'd be sitting on a $710 billion surplus by 2009. They were way off. The Center for American Progress breaks down how we got from there to here.It shouldn't be all that surprising that "President Bush's policies" account for 40 percent of the current deficit-he had eight years to affect things and Obama's had less than one. But this is a nice reminder that deficits and surpluses are built over time-it doesn't always make sense to blame or credit the guy who's currently in charge for the numbers you're seeing in the news.
elections and politics
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A study found running marathons might reverse some signs of aging

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Even though marathon running is on the decline, half a million people signed up to participate in the 2020 London Marathon. It seems wild that someone would voluntarily sign up to run 26.2 miles, but those half a million people might actually be on to something. A new study published in the Journal of the American College of Cardiology found that running a marathon can help reverse signs of aging.

Researchers at Barts and University College London looked at 138 first-time marathon runners between the ages of 21 and 69. "We wanted to look at novice athletes. We didn't include people who said they ran for more than two hours a week," Dr. Charlotte Manisty, the study's senior author and cardiologist at University College London, said per CNN.

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Japanese billionaire is giving away $9 million to his Twitter followers in a happiness experiment

via Stu Hansen / Twitter

In a move that feels like the subject line of a spam email or the premise of a bad '80s movie, online shopping mogul Yusaku Maezawa is giving away money as a social experiment.

Maezawa will give ￥1 million yen ($9,130) to 1,000 followers who retweeted his January 1st post announcing the giveaway. The deadline to retweet was Tuesday, January 7.

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Business

The world is rallying around Tori, the Target employee Tweet-shamed by an irate cheapskate

via David Leavitt / Twitter

Anyone who has ever worked in retail knows that the worst thing about the job, right after the pay, are the unreasonable cheapskates who "want to talk to your manager" to get some money off an item.

They think that throwing a tantrum will save them a few bucks and don't care if they completely embarrass themselves in the process. Sometimes that involves belittling the poor employee who's just trying to get through their day with an ounce of dignity.

Twitter is rallying around a gal named Tori who works at a Target in Massachusetts after she was tweet-shamed by irate chapekate, journalist, and Twitter troll, David Leavitt.

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