From the NYT:

Income inequality grew significantly in 2005, with the top 1 percent of Americans -- those with incomes that year of more than $348,000 -- receiving their largest share of national income since 1928, analysis of newly released tax data shows.

The top 10 percent, roughly those earning more than $100,000, also reached a level of income share not seen since before the Depression. ...

The new data also shows that the top 300,000 Americans collectively enjoyed almost as much income as the bottom 150 million Americans. Per person, the top group received 440 times as much as the average person in the bottom half earned, nearly doubling the gap from 1980.

The disparities may be even greater for another reason. The Internal Revenue Service estimates that it is able to accurately tax 99 percent of wage income but that it captures only about 70 percent of business and investment income, most of which flows to upper-income individuals, because not everybody accurately reports such figures.

Apropos of nothing, I found this on YouTube.

Kyiv is expected to be the scene of large protest rallies this weekend, with demonstrators on the side of pro-Western President Viktor Yushchenko and his pro-Russia rival, Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovych, expected to gather -- and possibly clash. Yushchenko is threatening to call a snap election.

Foreign fighters and local tribesmen in the area of South Waziristan, Pakistan continue to duke it out, with 52 reported deaths Friday.

From the BBC:

A Swiss man has been jailed for 10 years after pleading guilty to charges of insulting the Thai king.

Oliver Jufer, 57, was arrested last December after drunkenly spray-painting portraits of King Bhumibol Adulyadej in the northern city of Chiang Mai.

Earlier this month he pleaded guilty to five charges under Thailand's draconian lese majeste law. ...

Jufer, who had faced a maximum sentence of 75 years, has lived in Thailand for more than 10 years.

He was recorded on surveillance cameras defacing the portraits on the king's 79th birthday.

Earlier he had tried to buy alcohol but been refused, since such sales are sometimes banned on important days. King Bhumibol, the world's longest-serving current head of state, is a very popular figure in Thailand.

The Beeb corro says the Thai media are staying far, far away from this story.

From the March 26 BBC story:

Tribesmen in Pakistan's tribal region bordering Afghanistan have promised not to shelter foreign militants.

The assurance came as part of a deal signed by the government and local tribes in Bajaur agency.

Unlike other controversial deals in the troubled Waziristan region nearby, this deal was with tribesmen not militants.

Starbucks has launched a line of bottled water called Ethos. For every bottle they sell, 10 cents (in Canada, a nickel elsewhere) will go to providing people in developing countries with potable water.

Great, except they're selling the water for $2.49 (tax in). And they scheduled a Walk for Water for today, the same day that the NGO group WaterCan had scheduled a fundraising walk.

One of the bright lights of the U.S. economy has been the steadily rising value of homes. However, one thing driving the boom has been cheap, high-risk credit, and that particular chicken is coming home to roost. This NYT story is about how Cleveland and some other hard-hit U.S. cities are trying to stave off blight and real estate panic.

Seems strange that a rain forest could be devastated by drought, doesn't it? Well, it happened to the Amazon rainforest in 2005. Global warming may have been a factor, and scientists are trying to figure out what that could mean for the future.

Blackwater USA is probably the world's biggest private army. These mercenaries contractors play a key role in the Iraq occupation. Investigative journalist Jeremy Scahill talks to Democracy Now! about his new book Blackwater: The Rise of the World's Most Powerful Mercenary Army.

Think we're the only country with an aging workforce? Guess again. China's starting to suffer a shortage of young, cheap workers. And that could have, er, consequences.

Two Manhattanites are trying to live a zero-impact life for a year.

And the climate change deniers were there to greet him.

Earlier this week, a U.S. House of Representatives committee released more material showing the Bush administration's systematic efforts to weaken reports on climate change by playing down the human/causation link.