* CPI Falls
* Mall Co. Bust
* Obama’s Taxes
* Lawmakers Ethics Probes
* Octomom ™

__________

These are the stories I am interested in this morning:

• For the first time since 1955, the Consumer Price Index has fallen for the year. The Labor Department said the CPI fell 0.1 percent for March, after increasing 0.4 percent in February. Most analysts expected a 0.1 percent rise.
• Nation’s second largest mall operator filed for bankruptcy. Early this morning, General Growth Properties Inc., filed for Chapter Eleven. The mall operator, with 200 malls in 44 states, had been suffering under enormous debt brought about by a housing-boom expansion. It owes $27 billion, with reported assets of $29.6 billion. It filed for bankruptcy protection after failing to convince its creditors to give it more time to refinance.
• The First Family (and Second Family) celebrated Tax Day by filing and releasing their tax returns. The Obamas reported an adjusted gross income of $2,656,902, mostly from book sales. The Bidens reported $269,256, mostly from Senate salary.

• 

  The new Office of Congressional Ethics has opened reviews on ten lawmakers. The office was created last year to help Congress police itself (“drain the swamp,” according to Speaker Pelosi). It keeps its activities secret, but in a quarterly filing Wednesday some details emerged. The full list of reviewees was not released, but these are known so far: Rep. Jesse Jackson Jr. (D-Ill.); Charles Rangel (D-N.Y.); John Murtha (D-Pa.). Just being under review does NOT mean there is anything worth forwarding to the full Ethics Committee.

• Octomom seeks trademark on self. Nadya Suleman, the 33-year-old mother of 14 who gave birth to octuplets, has filed an application to trademark her media nickname. She plans to market a line of baby products and a reality TV show that would follow her children until they are 18. “What I’m doing with this TV show is basically creating documentaries about the lives of my children,” she told Life And Style Magazine. “It will give me the opportunity to have incredible home movies that, believe me, I don’t have the time to make myself.” Suleman has competition: Super Happy Fun Fun Inc. also filed an application in March. That company wants to make Octomom action figures.

Thanks for reading,

Brad