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Headlines (Scroll down for complete stories):
1. Rick Perry Eyeing White House Run in 2016
2. Climate Change Alarmist Recants: 'I Made a Mistake'
3. China Hacked Blueprints for U.S. Fighter Jets
4. Obama Spends $8.3 Billion to Hide Medicare Cuts
5. U.S., Europe Gird for 'Carbon Trade War'
6. Germany to Publish 'Mein Kampf' Again

1. Rick Perry Eyeing White House Run in 2016

Texas Gov. Rick Perry's disclosure that he's "really interested" in running for president again in 2016 has some observers wondering if he thinks Mitt Romney won't unseat President Barack Obama in November.

In a recent interview with CBS 11 News in Dallas-Fort Worth, Perry said: "2016 is way down the road, but I'll assure you one thing -- if I decide to run for the presidency in 2016, I'll be in way before the summer of 2016, 2015 even."

Reporter Jack Fink asked: "It sounds like you're really interested?"

Perry responded: "Yeah, I am. I love this country. As long as my health stays good, as it is, and my family is supportive, I'm certainly going to give it a good examination."

Perry announced in August 2011 that he would run for president in 2012, but dropped out of the race on Jan. 9 and endorsed Newt Gingrich.

Commenting on his talk of another run in 2016, the Houston Chronicle observed: "Statements like that don't make it seem like Perry has much faith in a Republican winning the presidential election this November. And if he does [win], it doesn't seem like he has much faith in Romney being a very good president."

Another Romney rival for the 2012 GOP nomination, Rick Santorum, has also suggested he is considering a run in 2016, telling Fox News: "I feel like a young man, and hopefully I feel like a young man four years from now."

As for whether Perry will run for re-election for governor in 2014, Perry told CBS: "I'm certainly going to give that the appropriate consideration. My instincts are very positive towards it right now."

2. Climate Change Alarmist Recants: 'I Made a Mistake'

British environmental expert James Lovelock now admits he was an "alarmist" regarding global warming -- and says Al Gore was too.

Lovelock previously worked for NASA and became a guru to the environmental movement with his "Gaia" theory of the Earth as a single organism. In 2007 Time magazine named Lovelock one of its "Heroes of the Environment," and he won the Geological Society of London's Wollaston Medal in 2006 for his writings on the Gaia theory.

That year he wrote an article in a British newspaper asserting that "before this century is over billions of us will die and the few breeding pairs of people that survive will be in the Arctic where the climate remains tolerable."

But in an interview this week with MSNBC, Lovelock said a book he is now writing will reflect his new opinion that global warming has not occurred as he had expected.

"The problem is we don't know what the climate is doing," he said. "We thought we knew 20 years ago. That led to some alarmist books -- mine included -- because it looked clear-cut, but it hasn't happened.

"The climate is doing its usual tricks. There's nothing much really happening yet. We were supposed to be halfway toward a frying world now.

"The world has not warmed up very much since the millennium. Twelve years is a reasonable time. [The temperature] has stayed almost constant, whereas it should have been rising. Carbon dioxide is rising, no question about that.

"We will have global warming, but it's been deferred a bit."

MSNBC reported: "He pointed to Gore's 'An Inconvenient Truth' and Tim Flannery's 'The Weather Makers' as other examples of 'alarmist' forecasts of the future."

Lovelock also declared in the interview that "as an independent and a loner," he did not mind saying, "All right, I made a mistake," adding that university or government scientists might fear that admission of such a mistake could jeopardize their funding.

In response to Lovelock's interview, the Climate Depot website stated: "MSNBC, perhaps the most unlikely of news sources, reports on what may be seen as the official end of the manmade global warming fear movement."

3. China Hacked Blueprints for U.S. Fighter Jets

Chinese hackers stole the blueprints for America's new Joint Strike Fighter planes, the F-35 and F-22 -- an example of cyberattacks that can "devastate our nation," a leading congressman disclosed.

"I think it's important that the American people have a better idea of what is at risk," Rep. Michael McCaul, R-Texas, chairman of the House Homeland Security Subcommittee on Oversight, Investigations and Management, said at a subcommittee hearing on Tuesday.

"When I look at the theft of intellectual property to the tune of $1 trillion, that's a serious economic issue for the United States.

"When I look at countries like China, who have stolen our Joint Strike Fighters, F-35 and F-22s, stolen those blueprints so they can manufacture those planes and then guard against those planes.

"Make no mistake, America is under attack by digital bombs. There are several things the American public should understand about these attacks. They are real, stealthy and persistent and can devastate our nation.

"China's cyber warfare capabilities and the espionage campaigns they have undertaken are the most prevalent of any nation state actor. China has created citizen hacker groups, engaged in cyberespionage, established cyberwar military units."

In addition to stealing vital information on America's weapons programs and security, he warned that cyberattacks could also blow up natural gas pipelines, derail trains, hack financial systems, and cause chemical plants to leak toxins, The Hill reported.

Larry Wortzel, a member of the United States-China Economic and Security Review Commission, told the House Foreign Affairs Committee at a March 28 hearing that the People's Liberation Army of China has made cyberattacks a "cornerstone" of its operations.

A commission report noted that Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman, and British Aerospace and Engineering have reportedly experienced penetrations from China-based hackers in the past three years.

Newsmax reported last August that the Internet security firm McAfee had uncovered the largest series of cyberattacks ever -- for five years hackers infiltrated 72 organizations including defense firms and the American government -- and security experts pointed to China as the culprit.

At Tuesday's subcommittee hearing, security experts told the panel that Russia, Iran and North Korea are also experimenting with cyberattacks, Voice of America News reported.

They said threats to the U.S. electric power grid and mass transportation systems could come from foreign intelligence services, anti-American computer hackers and terrorists.

4. Obama Spends $8.3 Billion to Hide Medicare Cuts

The Obama administration is spending $8.3 billion to hide a key provision of Obamacare -- deep cuts in Medicare Advantage -- until after the November election.

Medicare Advantage offers seniors the option of choosing private insurance companies as an alternative to the government-run Medicare insurance program. So far 12 million seniors have enrolled in the program.

But President Obama has attacked the program, stating in a 2009 speech that it offers "unwarranted subsidies" that "do everything to pad [insurance companies'] profits and nothing to improve your care."

So it came as no surprise when Obama's healthcare reform plan sliced $145 billion from Medicare Advantage over the next 10 years. Medicare's own actuary reported that Obamacare would force more than 7 million seniors off their private plans and back into traditional Medicare as insurers flee the market, according to Investor's Business Daily (IBD).

To hide the cuts from seniors who would face losing Medicare Advantage just before the November election, the administration pumped $8.3 billion back into the program through "bonuses" to Medicare Advantage plans.

Those "bonuses" will make up for more than 70 percent of Obamacare's scheduled Medicare Advantage cuts, and keep the program running through the election.

The plan is so "transparently political" that the Government Accountability Office has urged the Health and Human Services Department to cancel it altogether, IBD reported, adding: "Canceling is just the beginning.

"The bigger question lawmakers must answer is this: Can it really be legal for a Cabinet agency to spend $8.3 billion in taxpayer money simply to help Obama get re-elected?"

5. U.S., Europe Gird for 'Carbon Trade War'

The European Union is setting off a confrontation with outside nations -- including the United States -- by demanding that all airlines pay a carbon tax when crossing EU airspace and landing at EU airports.

"The new EU system is portentous. It is an extension of the continent's cap-and-trade system from domestic sources to the international arena," according to Claude Barfield, resident scholar at the American Enterprise Institute (AEI).

"Though other nations protested as the rules were being formulated, the new legislation went into effect on January 1, 2012" and the tax will start being collected in 2013.

Significantly, the tax based on carbon emissions will be levied not just on the miles flown in EU airspace, but for the entire length of an aircraft's flight, Barfield reveals in an article headlined "The First Carbon Trade War?" in The American, the journal of the AEI.

That means a Korean Air jet, for instance, will have to pay a tax based not on the few hundred miles it flies over the EU but over the entire trip of several thousand miles from Korea to Europe.

The 27-member EU's action has produced threats of retaliation. More than 20 nations, including the United States, China, Russia, India, Brazil, and South Africa, have met twice to discuss responses. The countries cited potential retaliatory actions including banning airlines from paying the tax and imposing commensurate levies on EU airlines flying in their airspace.

China and India have already banned their airlines from paying the tax, Russia has threatened to cancel air rights for EU airlines flying over Siberia, and China has delayed and possibly will cancel aircraft contracts with the European aerospace company Airbus worth $12 billion.

On the other hand, "the United States has equivocated," Barfield disclosed. "The House passed a bill making it illegal for U.S. airlines to comply with the EU scheme. But the State Department has thus far resisted efforts to bring the matter before the international body that sets rules for international airspace, the U.N.'s International Civil Aviation Organization.

"The Obama administration can drag its heels only so long before pressure from U.S. airlines and their supporters in Congress (particularly in an election year) becomes politically dangerous."

The Wall Street Journal observed: "Europe can help spark a global trade war nobody can afford over a tax nobody needs in furtherance of an anticarbon nirvana that never will come to pass."

6. Germany to Publish 'Mein Kampf' Again

Germany will officially publish Adolf Hitler's book "Mein Kampf" for the first time since the end of World War II.

Hitler wrote the first part of "Mein Kampf" ("My Struggle") in 1923, while he was serving a prison sentence for attempting to overthrow the government. The second part was written a year later, after his release.

When the war ended, the rights to the anti-Semitic book became the property of the Bavarian state government, which nationalized the Nazi publication house and prohibited further publication of the work.

That prohibition remains in place today. But the rights to the book are scheduled to expire in 2015, 70 years after Hitler's death, and there are concerns that neo-Nazi groups will begin publishing and distributing copies of the work to advance anti-Semitic agendas, the Israeli newspaper Haaretz reports.

To counter that, the government will publish an annotated edition of the book, containing warnings to readers about the dangers of Hitler's racist doctrine.

The government will also publish a special version of the book for schools, which will emphasize the "worldwide catastrophe brought about by this way of thinking," according to Bavarian Finance Minister Markus Soeder.

An English translation will be available as well.

Bavaria will ask publishers and bookstores not to print or sell other versions of the book beside the annotated version, according to Haaretz.

Much of Hitler's 720-page book deals with the "struggle between races" and "the Jewish problem" in Germany and the rest of the world. It was originally titled "Four and a Half Years of Struggle Against Lies, Stupidity, and Cowardice."

Headlines (Scroll down for complete stories):
1. Welfare Spending Up 41 Percent Under Obama
2. European Court: U.S. Supermax Prison Not 'Inhumane'
3. Trump's Birthday Bash for Ann Romney Raises $660K
4. Study: Polar Bear Population 'Not in Crisis'
5. Highest Sales Taxes Are in Alabama
6. Climate Change Alarmist: Let Skeptics' Houses Burn

1. Welfare Spending Up 41% Under Obama

In 1964, when President Lyndon Johnson declared a "war on poverty" in America, the poverty rate stood at around 19%.

Since then, total federal, state, and local spending on anti-poverty programs has amounted to $15 trillion, yet the poverty rate now stands at 15.1%, the highest level in nearly a decade.

"Clearly we are doing something wrong," according to the Cato Institute, which has released a new policy analysis on welfare spending that calls the war on poverty a "failure."

The federal government will spend more than $668 billion on anti-poverty programs this year, an increase of 41 percent or more than $193 billion since President Barack Obama took office. State and local government expenditures will amount to another $284 billion, bringing the total to nearly $1 trillion -- far more than the $685 billion spent on defense.

Federal, state and local governments now spend $20,610 a year for every poor person in the United States, or $61,830 for each poor family of three.

"Given that the poverty line for that family is just $18,530, we should have theoretically wiped out poverty in America many times over," writes Michael Tanner, director of health and welfare studies at the Cato Institute and author of "The Poverty of Welfare: Helping Others in Civil Society."

Most welfare programs are means-tested programs providing cash, food, housing, medical care, or other benefits to low-income persons and families, or programs targeted at communities or disadvantaged groups, such as the homeless.

The federal government alone now funds 126 separate and often overlapping programs designed to fight poverty, Tanner points out.

There are 33 housing programs run by four different cabinet departments, 21 programs providing food or food-purchasing assistance administered by three different federal departments and one independent agency, and eight healthcare programs administered by five separate agencies within the Department of Health and Human Services.

The largest welfare program is Medicaid, which provides benefits to 49 million Americans and cost more than $228 billion last year, followed by the food stamps program, with 41 million participants and a price tag of nearly $72 billion. Other programs range from Federal Pell Grants ($41 billion) down to lower-cost programs such as Weatherization Assistance for Low Income Persons ($250 million) and the Senior Farmers Market Nutrition Program ($20 million).

At least 106 million Americans receive benefits from one or more of these programs. Including entitlements such as Social Security and Medicare and salaries for government employees, more than half of Americans now receive a substantial portion of their income from the government.

"Clearly we are spending more than enough money to have significantly reduced poverty, yet we haven't," Tanner concludes.

"The vast majority of current programs are focused on making poverty more comfortable rather than giving people the tools that will help them escape poverty.

"And we actually have a pretty solid idea of the keys to getting out of and staying out of poverty: finish school, do not get pregnant outside marriage, and get a job, any job, and stick with it."

2. European Court: U.S. Supermax Prison Not 'Inhumane'

Lawyers for al-Qaida terrorist Abu Hamza and five other men indicted on terror charges argued before a European court that they would face "inhumane or degrading treatment or punishment" if extradited to the United States and jailed at the Supermax prison in Colorado.

But the Strasbourg, France-based European Court of Human Rights has ruled that the facility provides prisoners with more generous services and activities than do most prisons in Europe.

The attorneys had argued that incarcerating the men at the Supermax (super-maximum security) facility in Florence, Colo. -- officially called the United States Penitentiary Administrative Maximum and also known as ADX Florence -- would violate article three of the European Convention on Human Rights.

The seven-judge panel ruled unanimously on April 10 that article three would not be violated "as a result of conditions of detention at ADX Florence."

The panel stated that while inmates at ADX Florence are confined to their cells most of the time, they are also "provided with services and activities (television, radio, newspapers, books, hobby and craft items, telephone calls, social visits, correspondence with families, group prayer) which went beyond what was provided in most prisons in Europe."

It also noted that some of the prison's inmates are in a "step-down program." The program runs on a three-year cycle, with prisoners kept in their cells 23 hours a day for the first year, then gradually allowed more contact with other inmates. In their third year they may be out of their cells for up to 16 hours a day, CNS News reported.

According to a Federal Bureau of Prisons document, inmates can receive five visits a month, with up to three visitors each time. Visits can last a maximum of seven hours.

Inmates may also play basketball, handball, and table games, and purchase snacks, toiletries, stationery, games, batteries, digital radios, and prayer rugs, according to CNS News.

Inmates serving life sentences at ADX Florence include "Unabomber" Theodore Kaczynski, so-called shoe bomber Richard Reid, 1993 World Trade Center bombing mastermind Ramzi Yousef, and Oklahoma City co-conspirator Terry Nichols.

Abu Hamza is charged with funding al-Qaida training camps in Afghanistan and helping a group that kidnapped 16 Western tourists in Yemen in 1998. Four hostages died.

He and the other five terror suspects are currently behind bars in Britain. They have three months to appeal the court's decision before a final ruling is handed down.

3. Trump's Birthday Bash for Ann Romney Raises $660K

A luncheon hosted by Donald and Melania Trump in honor of Ann Romney's 63rd birthday raised more than $660,000 for Mitt Romney's presidential campaign.

The Tuesday event at the Trumps' Manhattan triplex was originally set to hold 200 people. But when that capacity was filled within 48 hours of invitations going out, the campaign "began to panic," according to Trump spokesman Michael Cohen, and asked if the guest list could be extended to 400 persons.

The $1,000-a-plate luncheon then had to be held in two shifts, with the first attending and spending time with Ann Romney from noon to 1:15 p.m. and the second from 1:30 to 3:00, CBS News reported.

The birthday cake at the affair was created by celebrity chef Buddy Valastro of the Bravo TV show "Cake Boss," and featured an ornament of Ann Romney atop a horse standing in a field of green frosting, according to ABC News. Romney is an avid horseback rider.

Donald Trump endorsed Mitt Romney in February and has since recorded robo-calls for the GOP's presumptive nominee.

Spokesman Cohen said Tuesday's Trump event proved so successful that the Romney campaign asked the real estate mogul to host another fundraiser when Romney secures the nomination. Cohen said tickets to that event would sell for $50,000 and 50 donors have already expressed interesting in attending.

4. Study: Polar Bear Population 'Not in Crisis'

Climate change doomsayers have for years claimed that declining polar bear populations in the Arctic are a consequence of manmade global warming.

But a new study has found that the bear population in part of Canada is larger than many scientists thought and might actually be growing.

In 2004, Environment Canada researchers concluded that the number of bears along the western shore of Hudson Bay had dropped 22 percent since 1984, to 935 bears, and they estimated that by 2011, a continuing decrease would bring the number down to 610.

The Hudson Bay region is considered a bellwether for how polar bears are faring elsewhere in the Arctic, according to Canadian newspaper The Globe and Mail.

The decrease, the scientists asserted, was due to warming temperatures that melt ice faster and ruin the bears' ability to hunt.

"That sparked worldwide concern about the future of the bears and prompted the Canadian and American governments to introduce legislation to protect them," The Globe and Mail reported.

The World Wildlife Fund even stated in 2008: "If current warming trends continue unabated, scientists believe that polar bears will be vulnerable to extinction within the next century."

But a survey released on April 4 by the Government of Nunavut -- a federal territory of Canada -- shows that the number of bears is now 1,013 and could be higher.

"The bear population is not in crisis as people believed," said Drikus Gissing, Nunavut's director of wildlife management. "There is no doom and gloom."

He added that the media in Canada have led people to believe that polar bears are endangered, but "they are not."

He estimated that there are about 25,000 polar bears in Canada's Arctic region, and "that's likely the highest [number] there has ever been."

Nunavut, which is the size of Western Europe, is home to only about 32,000 people.

5. Highest Sales Taxes Are in Alabama

Sales taxes in major American cities range from 10% down to zero and can have a significant impact on a locality's economic competitiveness, according to a new Tax Foundation report.

"Evasion of sales tax is most likely to occur in areas where there is a significant difference between two jurisdictions' sales tax rates," the report states.

"Research indicates that consumers can and do leave high-tax areas to make major purchases in low-tax areas, such as from cities to suburbs."

Also, businesses sometimes locate just outside high tax areas to avoid their rates.

"State and local governments should be cautious about raising rates too high relative to their neighbors because doing so may lead to revenue losses despite the higher tax rate," the report adds.

Among U.S. cities with a population over 200,000, residents pay the highest combined state and local tax rate in two Alabama cities, Birmingham and Montgomery. The state imposes a 4 percent tax, and the local rate in both cities is 6 percent, for a total of 10 percent.

They are followed by Chicago, Seattle, and Glendale, Arizona, where the combined rate is 9.5%.

Next is Phoenix at 9.3%, followed by Memphis and Nashville in Tennessee, at 9.25%.

The report notes that in some cases, parts of the city are in different counties and so the total rate may vary within the city.

Also, the items that are taxed can vary greatly. For example, most states exempt groceries from sales taxes, others tax them at a lower rate, and others tax them at the same rate as other items.

At the other end of the rate scale are two cities that are in states with no sales tax and impose no local sales tax: Portland, Ore., and Anchorage, Alaska.

Cities where buyers pay no local sales tax but do pay a state tax include Norfolk and Richmond, Va.; Louisville and Lexington, Ky.; and Newark and Jersey City, N.J., along with Indianapolis, Detroit, Boston, and Baltimore.

The Tax Foundation concludes: "Sales taxes are just one part of an overall tax structure and should be considered in context. For example, Washington State has high sales taxes but no income tax; Oregon has no sales tax, but high income taxes.

"While many factors influence business location and investment decisions, sales taxes are something within policymakers' control that can have immediate impacts. One gauge of competitiveness is how a city's sales tax rate compares to its neighbors."

6. Climate Change Alarmist: Let Skeptics' Houses Burn

The war of words between those warning of the dangers of manmade global warming and those who are skeptical of the threat is really getting nasty.

Steve Zwick, who says he writes about "the economic value of nature's services" and is termed a "warmist" by the Climate Depot website, points to one recent poll showing that the majority of Americans see a link between extreme weather and man's actions.

He writes on Forbes magazine's website: "At the same time, however, the denial machine is ratcheting up its disinformation campaign.

"This propaganda has already set us back two decades, during which the costs of dealing with climate change have risen and our chances of curtailing it have diminished.

"Let's take a page from those Tennessee firemen we heard about a few times last year -- the ones who stood idly by as houses burned to the ground because their owners had refused to pay a measly $75 fee.

"We can apply this same logic to climate change."

Referring to "active denialists" who "create the lies," Zwick states: "Let's start keeping track of them now, and when the famines come, let's make them pay. Let's let their houses burn. Let's swap their safe land for submerged land. Let's force them to bear the cost of rising food prices.

"They broke the climate. Why should the rest of us have to pay for it?"

In the most recent poll on the issue by Rasmussen Reports, just 40 percent of respondents said that global warming is primarily due to "human activity," while 44 percent attributed it to "long-term planetary trends."