By Amber Payne, Producer, NBC NewsTOLEDO, Ohio -- It’s the 14th straight year of low water levels for the $34 billion shipping industry that relies on the Great Lakes.And for ships like the Mesabi Miner, that comes at a great cost.On a recent Saturday the vessel drifted through the Detroit River and docked in Toledo, where the crew began the eight-hour process of unloading 66,000 tons of iron ore,...

The possibilities when it comes to marketing meat made from marijuana-fed animals are close to endless, but the man who came up with the idea has decided to simply call them “Pot Pigs.”William von Scheneidau, owner and founder of BB Ranch in Seattle, didn’t come up with the idea to feed pigs and other animals weed while sitting around a bong in the basement with his buddies.In fact, he doesn’t eve...

Michael Hastings, the journalist best known for the 2010 Rolling Stone story that led to the resignation of Gen. Stanley McChrystal, died Tuesday in a car crash in Los Angeles, his employers at BuzzFeed and Rolling Stone announced.He was 33."We are shocked and devastated by the news that Michael Hastings is gone," BuzzFeed editor-in-chief Ben Smith said in a statement Tuesday evening. "Michael wa...

Ever since Edward Snowden revealed himself as the leaker of classified documents about U.S. surveillance programs, he has sometimes been called a whistle-blower. But is he?Those who believe he has shed light on improper government actions say he deserves to be called one. But there seems little doubt that he cannot claim legal whistle-blower protection.For starters, the general whistle-blower laws...

The National Security Agency is reviewing whether to stop collecting a vast stockpile of records of Americans’ telephone calls — the most controversial component of its surveillance programs— by allowing telecommunications companies to retain the data until U.S. intelligence officials have a specific reason to review it for possible connections to terror plots, U.S. officials said TuesdayThe NSA’s...

A cognitively disabled woman and her young daughter were held against their will in an Ohio home for more than two years, forced to perform manual labor, threatened by poisonous snakes, and beaten to scare them from ever escaping, authorities announced on Tuesday.Jessica L. Hunt, 31, and Daniel J. Brown, 33, and Jordie L. Callahan, 26, were arrested in Ashland, Ohio, and charged with forced labor ...