No Sunspots Facing Eaeth Today, but the Backside of the Sun Is Kicking It Out. the Solar

No sunspots facing Eaeth today, but the backside of the Sun is kicking it out. The solar wind is 377.9 and the proton count is up to 2.9. On March 17th, St. Patrick's Day, a CME hit Earth's magnetic field, sparking shamrock-green auroras around the Arctic Circle. Many photographers were exhausted from staying up all night to record the display

A bright meteor briefly outshined the lights of New York City Friday evening (March 22), according to reports by witnesses who used Twitter and the Internet to report sightings of the fireball streaking over a broad stretch of the U.S. East Coast.

"Strange Friday night … a meteor passed over my house tonight!" wrote one New Yorker writing as Yanksmom19.

The first fireball sightings came at about 8 p.m. EDT (0000 March 23 GMT) and sparked more than 500 witness reports to the American Meteor Society. Reports of the meteor flooded Twitter from New York, Boston and Washington, D.C

The Earth is bombarded by nearly 100 tons of material from space every day, but most of those objects are tiny dust grains that burn up harmlessly in the atmosphere.

NASA scientists and astronomers around the world regularly monitor the night sky for signs of larger asteroids that could pose an impact threat to Earth. Friday night's meteor came just days after back-to-back hearings in the House and Senate about the dangers posed by near-Earth asteroids. Those meetings were scheduled in the wake of the Feb. 15 Russian meteor explosion.

North Korea warned of “strong military counter-action” if the U.S. again flies B-52 bombers over the Korean peninsula, with two flights this month after the totalitarian regime threatened preemptive nuclear strikes.

The U.S. Pacific Air Forces Command successfully carried out the latest training flight, 7th Air Force spokeswoman Maj. RichelleDowdell said in an e-mail yesterday without giving further details. A B-52 can carry nuclear warheads and air-to- ground missiles with a range of 3,000 kilometers (1,864 miles).

North Korea Vows Military Action Against More U.S. B-52 Flights

A B-52 bomber flies over Osan, Gyeonggi Province, South Korea on March 19, 2013, as part of a joint U.S.-South Korea military drill.

A B-52 bomber flies over Osan, Gyeonggi Province, South Korea on March 19, 2013, as part of a joint U.S.-South Korea military drill. Photographer: Won Dai-Yeon/AFP/Getty Images

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North Korea Vows Military Action Against More U.S. B-52 Flights

KNS/AFP/Getty Images

North Korean leader Kim JongUn inspects a long-range artillery at an undisclosed place in North Korea in this undated picture released by Korean Central News Agency on March 12, 2013.

North Korean leader Kim JongUn inspects a long-range artillery at an undisclosed place in North Korea in this undated picture released by Korean Central News Agency on March 12, 2013. Source: KNS/AFP/Getty Images

The U.S. is increasing its defense capability in the region after Kim JongUn’s regime this month threatened to use atomic weapons in response to tougher United Nations sanctions. Tensions on the peninsula are the highest since at least 2010, with China also indirectly criticizing U.S. plans to bolster a regional anti-missile shield.

Yesterday’s sortie is an “unpardonable” provocation, introducing a mechanism to deliver a strategic nuclear strike to the Korean Peninsula “at a time when its situation is inching close to the brink of war,” an unidentified North Korean Foreign Ministry spokesman said today in a statement carried by the official Korean Central News Agency.

The North is closely watching the situation and “the hostile forces will never escape its strong military counter- action” if the B-52s fly sorties over the the peninsula again, according to the KCNA statement.

Military Drills

The first B-52 flight came on March 8 as part of joint U.S.-South Korea military drills, Defense Department spokesman George Little said in a March 18 statement. He said such flights are routine. The bomber was flown out of Andersen Air Force Base in Guam in the first week of the annual two-month Foal Eagle exercise which ends April 30.

“We are drawing attention to the fact we have extended deterrence capabilities that we believe are important to demonstrate in the wake of recent North Korean rhetoric,” Little said. “We are in the midst right now of sending a very strong signal that we have a firm commitment to the alliance with our Republic of Korea allies.”

Deputy Defense Secretary Ashton Carter on March 18 announced during his visit to South Korea that a second flight would take place the next day. He traveled to Seoul to reaffirm the commitment to deter North Korea at a time the U.S. faces multi-billion dollar defense budget cuts.

Shifting Missile Shield

U.S. Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel said March 15 he will shift $1 billion from a European missile shield to install 14 additional missile interceptors in Alaska against threats by Iran and North Korea. Russia has dismissed the move, muffling hopes of arms control advocates that the U.S. and Russia could improve relations and revive talks on reducing their nuclear arsenals.

South Korean President Park GeunHye yesterday reiterated her government’s stance to “firmly respond” to any attacks, while promising to give aid to North Korea if it gives up nuclear weapons and “chooses the right path,” according to a statement on her website

While the Green Energy garden party was announced to the world by the Washington elites, the smell of cake and free beer became irresistible. There were promises of grants, loans, guarantees, and enormous government contracts in the fliers that were dropped from green airplanes onto the petroleum-powered people below. Like a circus train puffing its way through the suburbs to the big top in the city center, it drew the people’s attention away from their dusty plant floors and rotting work uniforms.

From publicly-traded startups to sweating behemoths they elbowed their way to the bleachers. Everyone came, because to be seen was to have a chance at winning the prize. The President put on his circus hat and coat in August of 2009 and handed out $384 million in grants while holding the megaphone and pointing to this ring and that.

The people cheered each time a winning ticket was announced, but as the list was announced one by one the cheering began to subside. The crowd began to murmur, “What’s going on here?” and began to lower their heads and say, “It’s just the President’s friends. All the money is going to his campaign supporters.”

As the band played and the rattle of fresh popcorn fell away to the sound of the President’s motorcade heading off to the castle, the people shuffled back to their empty plants and televisions to the numb ignominy of unemployment. The grant money disappeared into the massive budgets of multi-national corporate giants like weekly lottery revenues into the State general fund.

Six trillion dollars later, the government has scavenged every loose dollar in the economy. The plants are still empty. The banks shut down all loan programs, except to loan money to federal government, and they invest all their deposits into money markets each night to earn profits on the tiny margins between currencies. The wealthy have done their best to liquidate their holdings and pack up their cash for safer places abroad.

Europe Plays I-Didn’t-Do-It Blame Game on Cyprus Bank Tax

By James G. Neuger - Mar 20, 2013 11:27 AM ET

To listen to the German and French governments, the European Central Bank and European Commission, no one was responsible for the Cypriot deposit tax that was unanimously endorsed in the early hours of March 16 and fell apart yesterday.

German Finance Minister Wolfgang Schaeuble opened the blame game on Sunday, telling ARD television that the commission, ECB and Cypriot government engineered the swoop on ordinary bank accounts and “now they have to explain it to the Cypriot people.”

Cypriot demonstrators shout slogans as they march towards the parliament in the capital, Nicosia, during a protest against an EU bailout deal on March 19, 2013.

Cypriot demonstrators shout slogans as they march towards the parliament in the capital, Nicosia, during a protest against an EU bailout deal on March 19, 2013. Photographer: Patrick Baz/AFP via Getty Images

Cypriot people were lining up at cash machines and painting “No” on the palms of their hands to protest the levy that, even with a tax-free allowance built in for the smallest savers, didn’t win a single “Yes” vote in the Cypriot parliament.

By then, the Cypriot people were lining up at cash machines and painting “No” on the palms of their hands to protest the levy that, even with a tax-free allowance built in for the smallest savers, didn’t win a single “Yes” vote in the Cypriot parliament.

“The Cyprus fiasco has the hallmark of a classic whodunit,” Sony Kapoor, head of the Re-Define think tank, said in an e-mailed note. “Someone somewhere took a decision that now no one nowhere appears to have made.”

Indignation in Nicosia led other finance ministers to disown what they had decided.

France’s Pierre Moscovici said he had wanted an exemption for accounts worth less than 100,000 euros ($129,500). Austria’s Maria Fekter said ECB demands made that impossible.

The central bank, Fekter said on Monday, wanted to lowball the tax on larger depositors, magnifying the hit on the smaller ones. JoergAsmussen, the ECB Executive Board member who took part in the finance chiefs’ all-night Brussels meeting, pleaded not guilty, saying the central bank didn’t insist on “this specific structure of the levy.”

‘All Elements’

Other non-authors of the tax on sub-100,000-euro accounts included Spanish Economy Minister Luis de Guindos, Finnish Finance Minister JuttaUrpilainen and the Brussels-based commission, which said today it wasn’t comfortable with the package in “all its elements” and added that “decisions are taken by the member states.”

Luxembourg Finance Minister Luc Frieden pointed at everyone, saying in a March 18 interview that it was a “very difficult compromise” backed by “all euro-zone member states,” the commission, ECB and International Monetary Fund.

A reconstruction based on interviews with European officials suggests the chain of causality went like this: first,Germany and the IMF demanded a full “bail-in” of Cypriot bank creditors and depositors; then, to counter this nuclear option, the commission, with ECB backing, came up with the levy idea; then the Cypriots, fearful of scaring away big, mostly Russian bank clients, spread the tax between the two classes of depositors.

One person who wasn’t at the Brussels meeting, German Chancellor Angela Merkel, had no trouble identifying the culprit. Cyprus has to give up “a banking model that isn’t sustainable,” she said at the DIHK chamber of commerce in Berlin today. “We all know that banks that take risks, banks that operate on the wrong model, are a threat not just for the home country but a threat for all.”

Cyprus was just hours away from a deal on Friday to raise billions of euros and unlock a bailout from the European Union that could avert financial meltdown and exit from the euro, its ruling party said.

The remarks from the deputy leader came after Moscow had rebuffed requests from Nicosia for assistance to save Cypriot banks in which Russians have billions of euros at risk.

He gave little detail beyond saying Cyprus was close to a compromise that would let parliament reverse its rejection of a rescue package offered by euro zone partners a week ago under which holders of bank deposits would suffer losses.

"There is cautious optimism that in the next few hours we may be able to reach an agreed platform so parliament can approve these specific measures which will be consistent with the approach, the framework and the targets agreed at the last Eurogroup," AverofNeophytou, deputy leader of President NicosAnastasiades's Democratic Rally, told reporters in the capital.

Germany warned Cyprus it was "playing with fire" but also kept up pressure by saying the euro zone was well able to contain any crisis - sticking to a threat to cut Cyprus off.

With the clock running down to a Monday deadline set by the European Central Bank when it will sever essential cash flows to Cypriot banks if no bailout program is agreed, Cyprus took a first step toward financial consolidation by arranging for the takeover of big Greek units of its banks by a Greek competitor.

Shares in Piraeus Bank in Athens shot up 20 percent before officials confirmed Piraeus would take control of the Greek units of Bank of Cyprus and Cyprus Popular Bank, two big retail lenders badly burned by exposure to Greece's own troubles.

Euro zone leaders, led by Germany, have offered Cyprus 10 billion euros ($13 billion) on condition it raises 5.8 billion of its own. A plan to fund that by taxing deposits - breaking what had hitherto been a taboo in efforts to stabilize the currency bloc - had led to parliament throwing out the deal.

EU officials criticized Cyprus for insisting on taxing even small savers whose deposits up to 100,000 euros benefit from a state guarantee - a measure Cypriot leaders favored in order to limit the losses for bigger depositors, many of them Russian and seen as vital to the future viability of the Cypriot economy.

RUSSIA DISAPPOINT

Hopes of favor from Moscow were disappointed on Friday.

Cypriot Finance Minister Michael Sarris left for home after failing to renegotiate a 2.5-billion euro loan from the Russian government, win new financing or lure Russian investors to Cyprus's banks and gas reserves.

The Bank of Cyprus urged the government to go back and make a deal with the EU, under which larger deposits over 100,000 euros, would be taxed. It was preferable, it said, to a collapse of the system and a return to the Cypriot pound which would wipe out assets. "There must be no further delay," the bank said.

EU leaders, notably Germans who face an election in six months, have been reluctant to give up on the bank levy since it protects them from accusations of using European taxpayers money to bail out big Russian investors in Cyprus.

While this had raised concern that it might erode confidence in banks in other, bigger euro zone states, notably Spain and Italy, the leaders of the euro zone have made clear they believe they can contain any damage, even it Cyprus is forced into a bankruptcy that would lead to it abandoning the euro.

German Finance Minister Wolfgang Schaeuble said on Friday that muted reactions to the crisis in financial markets showed the euro zone was able to contain the Cyprus problem.

On the island, lawmakers and banking officials were locked in talks inside parliament. Hundreds of angry Cypriots faced off with riot police outside.

On the table are proposals to nationalize pension funds, pool state assets and split Popular Bank in a desperate effort to satisfy exasperated European allies.

There were persistent rumors of a possible U-turn on the bank levy, targeting only big depositors with over 100,000 in Cypriot banks, many of the foreigners including Russians.

"PLAYING WITH FIRE"

Everything is subject to the approval of Cyprus's lenders at the EU, ECB and International Monetary Fund.

The head of the Eurogroup of euro zone ministers, Dutchman JeroenDijsselbloem, said it was focused on keeping Cyprus in the euro zone. Asked whether Cyprus's exit from the euro zone was inevitable, he did not rule it out, however:

"All kinds of scenarios are possible and the scenarios we're focusing on are to come to a joint solution in which Cyprus is saved but in which the banking sector continues in a smaller but healthier form."

Germany had rejected a proposal to nationalize pension funds and demanded Cyprus take an axe to its banks.

Chancellor Angela Merkel told lawmakers that while she wanted to keep Cyprus in the euro zone, the country must first recognize it had no future as an offshore financial center for wealthy Russians and Britons, two parliamentarians told Reuters.

Cypriots have been stunned by the pace of the unfolding drama, having elected conservative President NicosAnastasiades barely a month ago on a mandate to secure a bailout.

Depositors, who have been besieging bank cash machines all week, queued again on Friday to withdraw what they could.

"Our so-called friends and partners sold us out," said MariosPanayides, 65, a protester at the parliament. "They have completely abandoned us on the edge of an abyss."