Tobacco auction system is all but snuffed out – 12NewsNow.Com
Tobacco auction system is all but snuffed out12NewsNow.ComFarmers who have spent their lives tending the aromatic crop in their fields find comfort in Foy's rat-a-tat style, part of an auction system that's been all but snuffed out by another way of selling tobacco after years of declining smoking rates. "It …and more »
Gun sales boomed in November (local6)
Gun sales boomed in November, apparently fueled by Black Friday sales and stoked by Ferguson-related fears.
FBI background checks, which are required for most gun purchases, jumped by about 12 percent compared to October.
The bureau said it performed 1,803,397 checks in November.
This includes Black Friday, which set a record for gun sales, with 175,000 background checks just on that one day, according to the FBI.
Black Friday is typically a big day for gun sales. But November also saw violence in Ferguson, Missouri following a grand jury's decision to not indict a white police officer for killing an unarmed black man. Local gun sellers said the unrest — including the first wave in August right after the killing — spurred a huge increase in gun sales in the St. Louis area as people bought weapons to protect themselves.
Despite the month-to-month increase, background checks in November were down slightly from last year's level.
Gun sales are often driven by fear and anxiety. December of 2012 remains the record month for background checks, at 2,783,765. Midway through that month, a gunman killed 26 people, mostly kids, at Sandy Hook Elementary in Newtown, Connecticut. The massacre led to …
