budgeting personal finances

Conduct a Financial Fire Drill to Assess Financial Health

We conduct fire drills to ensure fire warning systems are functional and that building occupants know what to do in the event of a fire-related emergency. Apply that same type of stress test to your money with a financial fire drill.

Photo by Steve Snodgrass.

Finance and frugality blog Frugal Dad urges us to take stock of our financial health by conducting a financial fire drill. Just like a real fire drill helps you run through a dangerous scenario without risk—"Who put the file cabinets in front of the fire exit?"—a financial fire drill shows you how effective your escape routes are and how big your safety net is.

You'll need to gather up all your bills, take stock of your savings and emergency fund, and head over the Frugal Dad to run through their financial fire drill checklist—which includes great tips like making a slash-and-burn list of non-essential services you can cancel the minute you get laid off or in other financial trouble.

Conduct a Financial Fire Drill to Assess Financial Health

We conduct fire drills to ensure fire warning systems are functional and that building occupants know what to do in the event of a fire-related emergency. Apply that same type of stress test to your money with a financial fire drill.

Photo by Steve Snodgrass.

Finance and frugality blog Frugal Dad urges us to take stock of our financial health by conducting a financial fire drill. Just like a real fire drill helps you run through a dangerous scenario without risk—"Who put the file cabinets in front of the fire exit?"—a financial fire drill shows you how effective your escape routes are and how big your safety net is.

You'll need to gather up all your bills, take stock of your savings and emergency fund, and head over the Frugal Dad to run through their financial fire drill checklist—which includes great tips like making a slash-and-burn list of non-essential services you can cancel the minute you get laid off or in other financial trouble.

http://www.complaintsboard.com/complaints/alpine-payment-systems-c270446.html

http://www.complaintsboard.com/complaints/alpine-payment-systems-c270446.html

http://www.complaintsboard.com/complaints/alpine-payment-systems-c270446.html

Kara Dioguardi Without Makeup (&amp; Other <b>News</b>) - Starpulse.com

Kara Dioguardi showed up to the opening night of Cinderella at the El Portal Theatre in North Hollywood last night looking almost unrecognizable with hardly any makeup or hair styling. Looks like l...

Kim Kardashian is &#39;dead&#39; in new ad « Entertainment

Kim Kardashian will die on Wednesday. At least that's what her new ad says. The reality.

<b>News</b> And Notes: 11.29.2010 - Blueshirt Banter

News And Notes: 11.29.2010. ... News And Notes: 11.29.2010. Joe_2_tiny by Joe Fortunato on Nov 29, 2010 10:03 AM EST in Rangers Analysis � Tweet � 0 comments; Story-email Email; Printer Print ...

http://www.complaintsboard.com/complaints/alpine-payment-systems-c270446.html

http://www.complaintsboard.com/complaints/alpine-payment-systems-c270446.html

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http://www.complaintsboard.com/complaints/alpine-payment-systems-c270446.html

Business Making Money

Election week is done. It's time to get back to the business of finding real solutions for our nation's economic recovery. As this week ends it is clear that the appetite for federal stimuli is beginning its ebb tide. We see the Federal Reserve playing the risky cards of quantitative easing trying yet again to spark an economic recovery against the odds of a main street economy still mired in the collateral damage of central government's past grand visions.

Don't get me wrong. I actually agree that Fed needs to be doing what it is. We need to find a sustainable balance for our economy and it's a data intensive compass that can only be seen with clarity from the offices occupied by people like Ben Bernanke, Tim Geithner and Sheila Bair. What I do worry about though is that these central solutions too often take from the small and give to the big because the simplifying assumptions used by the economists and statisticians that support the process aren't capable of seeing the one-by-one trench warfare fights being fought by small businesses and individuals. It's an inherent policy formulation weakness of the academic brain trust behind our system that may be costing ordinary people more pain than necessary. But these ordinary Americans are there. We know this because they voted on Tuesday.

Fortunately, the United States is a big country and Washington D.C. isn't the only place exploring ways to find economic recovery formulae. Across the country, cities and states are beginning to chart independent paths to creating their own "islands of recovery". The City of Los Angeles' proposed Responsible Banking Ordinance continues to move through the committee process improving bit-by-bit into what I believe is an important emerging economic policy counterweight to ensure that the "small to big" tendencies of central solutions do not take us astray yet again.

The tale of the tape is something I believe worth sharing with the readers of the Huffington Post.

On October 26th, there was a public hearing by the L.A. City Jobs Committee chaired by Councilman Richard Alarcon on item CF 09-0234, Responsible Banking. The measure was approved with a number of questions to be investigated and reported to a hearing of the L.A. City Budget and Finance Committee to take place on Monday, November 8th. The questions aired by Councilman Bernard Parks focused on two areas. He asked for more information to determine if the cost and design of the process for implementation by the City was indeed workable. He also asked for clarification about how the differences between community banks, large complex banks and the city's debt underwriters would be recognized within the final ordinance.

Mr. Park's questions tell me that the L.A. process is indeed making progress because these are no longer questions about whether this a good thing for the economic interests of the City but rather how well is the plan risk managed. The interests behind the initiative become more positive as banks, large and small, begin to recognize that there is opportunity to be had here. The carrot being offered by the City of L.A is preference to win lucrative contracts that the City will be issuing anyway if evidence can be presented by the bidders that they are placing the interests of the region higher up the business priority list than their competition. It's subtle and far reaching in its potential to encourage money to circulate locally longer.

So now to ponder details,

As I reviewed the current version of the ordinance draft, it was clear the that City of Los Angeles had specified a data collection and reporting request that seeks to get banks to translate the nature of their business activities into measurement language that city governments can understand. The policy question is actually spot on but I'm also pretty sure that asking a bank to deliver the answer on a silver platter to the city first time out is a bit of a stretch. I think there's a better way to make it work for everyone and bring the cost/risk of the process well into good comfort.

The path to success here is to recognize two things. The first is that banks know how to report data to their regulators. They actually track all the information the city wants to know. Once a year they even have to report data to the granularity of branch-by-branch information to the FDIC. The other thing that's clear from the city draft is that municipal governments analyze their quality of service based on census tracts because that's how voters are bucketed. The trick in getting one system to talk to the other is to leverage by translating between the two universes via the zip codes of the U.S. postal service.

Asking the banks to do all the work is a lot of work. But if the City of Los Angeles were to re-design the ordinance implementation process to be a two step process where the banks report data in branches with identification of which zip codes are affected by that branch and there was a post- process by the City to morph the submittals into census tract visibility I think this would actually work reasonably well. City employees and/or other specialty vendors are more knowledgeable about the second step of the transformation than any bank will ever be. And there's a reason for that. Bankers, being lenders, have been discouraged from doing the second step for a long time because the technology that does so equates to gathering the data to do "red lining". So it's actually a better plan for the City of L.A. to deliberately separate these two steps from each other in its ordinance design.

My point here is that by taking a step back and recognizing where natural divisions of skill can be used to complement each other what seems onerous as an all-in-one data request can quickly become very doable.

This gets us to Mr. Park's second inquiry about larger out of area institutions and debt underwriters seeking to do business with the City. To that my observation is that the City of Los Angeles needs to set up a fair playing field for everyone. It's my read that by combining the suggestion above for banks with local branches with the tenets of the current ordinance draft language requesting distilled data into zip codes there's plenty of wiggle room for presentation of evidence of local involvement by these larger institutions, even those that do not have physical branches in the region. Complex transforms of data to support reporting requests are well within the capabilities of the IT departments of these larger businesses. Bearing in mind that these are also the banks that will go after the largest contracts with the City there's plenty of incentive for them to get their systems to produce the reports that will give them an advantage over competing bidders.

And in the long run I'm not just talking about competing just for L.A.'s business. There's a far larger universe of municipal and state government opportunities out there and I'll remind the readers of the Huffington post to look back at the history of my blogs for the one reporting on Bill Lockyer's inquiry earlier this year to the largest municipal bond underwriters.

I mean does anyone really think that the rest of America's League of Cities isn't watching how this plays out? Or that incoming California Governor Jerry Brown, the former Mayor of Oakland, doesn't already know that Los Angeles, San Jose and other cities in California are actively exploring how to affect the future of the State's economy using local strategies? Or that Ben Bernanke, Tim Geithner, Sheila Bair and Barack Obama won't read about this?

Keep going L.A. La-La Land may yet become the next shining star of economic recovery innovation.

All content is copyright their rightful owner. Republication of PSFK content should be properly credited (and linked to) as the source, including our URL: psfk.com. Consult other content owners directly about republication of their content.

Friends and partners:

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Web type <b>news</b>: iPhone and iPad now support TrueType font embedding <b>...</b>

This is also exciting news, as TrueType fonts are superior to SVG fonts in two very important ways: the files sizes are dramatically smaller (an especially important factor on mobile devices), and the rendering quality is much higher. ...

New Dragon Age 2 character unveiled <b>News</b> - Page 1 | Eurogamer.net

Read our news of New Dragon Age 2 character unveiled.

No Batmobile in Arkham City <b>News</b> - Page 1 | Eurogamer.net

Read our news of No Batmobile in Arkham City. ... Batman: Arkham Asylum 2 teaser 14 December, 2009. Latest News. Batman: Arkham City details emerge . Batman: Arkham City revealed, dated . Batman domains name Arkham sequel? ...

bench_craft_company

Web type <b>news</b>: iPhone and iPad now support TrueType font embedding <b>...</b>

This is also exciting news, as TrueType fonts are superior to SVG fonts in two very important ways: the files sizes are dramatically smaller (an especially important factor on mobile devices), and the rendering quality is much higher. ...

New Dragon Age 2 character unveiled <b>News</b> - Page 1 | Eurogamer.net

Read our news of New Dragon Age 2 character unveiled.

No Batmobile in Arkham City <b>News</b> - Page 1 | Eurogamer.net

Read our news of No Batmobile in Arkham City. ... Batman: Arkham Asylum 2 teaser 14 December, 2009. Latest News. Batman: Arkham City details emerge . Batman: Arkham City revealed, dated . Batman domains name Arkham sequel? ...

bench_craft_company

Election week is done. It's time to get back to the business of finding real solutions for our nation's economic recovery. As this week ends it is clear that the appetite for federal stimuli is beginning its ebb tide. We see the Federal Reserve playing the risky cards of quantitative easing trying yet again to spark an economic recovery against the odds of a main street economy still mired in the collateral damage of central government's past grand visions.

Don't get me wrong. I actually agree that Fed needs to be doing what it is. We need to find a sustainable balance for our economy and it's a data intensive compass that can only be seen with clarity from the offices occupied by people like Ben Bernanke, Tim Geithner and Sheila Bair. What I do worry about though is that these central solutions too often take from the small and give to the big because the simplifying assumptions used by the economists and statisticians that support the process aren't capable of seeing the one-by-one trench warfare fights being fought by small businesses and individuals. It's an inherent policy formulation weakness of the academic brain trust behind our system that may be costing ordinary people more pain than necessary. But these ordinary Americans are there. We know this because they voted on Tuesday.

Fortunately, the United States is a big country and Washington D.C. isn't the only place exploring ways to find economic recovery formulae. Across the country, cities and states are beginning to chart independent paths to creating their own "islands of recovery". The City of Los Angeles' proposed Responsible Banking Ordinance continues to move through the committee process improving bit-by-bit into what I believe is an important emerging economic policy counterweight to ensure that the "small to big" tendencies of central solutions do not take us astray yet again.

The tale of the tape is something I believe worth sharing with the readers of the Huffington Post.

On October 26th, there was a public hearing by the L.A. City Jobs Committee chaired by Councilman Richard Alarcon on item CF 09-0234, Responsible Banking. The measure was approved with a number of questions to be investigated and reported to a hearing of the L.A. City Budget and Finance Committee to take place on Monday, November 8th. The questions aired by Councilman Bernard Parks focused on two areas. He asked for more information to determine if the cost and design of the process for implementation by the City was indeed workable. He also asked for clarification about how the differences between community banks, large complex banks and the city's debt underwriters would be recognized within the final ordinance.

Mr. Park's questions tell me that the L.A. process is indeed making progress because these are no longer questions about whether this a good thing for the economic interests of the City but rather how well is the plan risk managed. The interests behind the initiative become more positive as banks, large and small, begin to recognize that there is opportunity to be had here. The carrot being offered by the City of L.A is preference to win lucrative contracts that the City will be issuing anyway if evidence can be presented by the bidders that they are placing the interests of the region higher up the business priority list than their competition. It's subtle and far reaching in its potential to encourage money to circulate locally longer.

So now to ponder details,

As I reviewed the current version of the ordinance draft, it was clear the that City of Los Angeles had specified a data collection and reporting request that seeks to get banks to translate the nature of their business activities into measurement language that city governments can understand. The policy question is actually spot on but I'm also pretty sure that asking a bank to deliver the answer on a silver platter to the city first time out is a bit of a stretch. I think there's a better way to make it work for everyone and bring the cost/risk of the process well into good comfort.

The path to success here is to recognize two things. The first is that banks know how to report data to their regulators. They actually track all the information the city wants to know. Once a year they even have to report data to the granularity of branch-by-branch information to the FDIC. The other thing that's clear from the city draft is that municipal governments analyze their quality of service based on census tracts because that's how voters are bucketed. The trick in getting one system to talk to the other is to leverage by translating between the two universes via the zip codes of the U.S. postal service.

Asking the banks to do all the work is a lot of work. But if the City of Los Angeles were to re-design the ordinance implementation process to be a two step process where the banks report data in branches with identification of which zip codes are affected by that branch and there was a post- process by the City to morph the submittals into census tract visibility I think this would actually work reasonably well. City employees and/or other specialty vendors are more knowledgeable about the second step of the transformation than any bank will ever be. And there's a reason for that. Bankers, being lenders, have been discouraged from doing the second step for a long time because the technology that does so equates to gathering the data to do "red lining". So it's actually a better plan for the City of L.A. to deliberately separate these two steps from each other in its ordinance design.

My point here is that by taking a step back and recognizing where natural divisions of skill can be used to complement each other what seems onerous as an all-in-one data request can quickly become very doable.

This gets us to Mr. Park's second inquiry about larger out of area institutions and debt underwriters seeking to do business with the City. To that my observation is that the City of Los Angeles needs to set up a fair playing field for everyone. It's my read that by combining the suggestion above for banks with local branches with the tenets of the current ordinance draft language requesting distilled data into zip codes there's plenty of wiggle room for presentation of evidence of local involvement by these larger institutions, even those that do not have physical branches in the region. Complex transforms of data to support reporting requests are well within the capabilities of the IT departments of these larger businesses. Bearing in mind that these are also the banks that will go after the largest contracts with the City there's plenty of incentive for them to get their systems to produce the reports that will give them an advantage over competing bidders.

And in the long run I'm not just talking about competing just for L.A.'s business. There's a far larger universe of municipal and state government opportunities out there and I'll remind the readers of the Huffington post to look back at the history of my blogs for the one reporting on Bill Lockyer's inquiry earlier this year to the largest municipal bond underwriters.

I mean does anyone really think that the rest of America's League of Cities isn't watching how this plays out? Or that incoming California Governor Jerry Brown, the former Mayor of Oakland, doesn't already know that Los Angeles, San Jose and other cities in California are actively exploring how to affect the future of the State's economy using local strategies? Or that Ben Bernanke, Tim Geithner, Sheila Bair and Barack Obama won't read about this?

Keep going L.A. La-La Land may yet become the next shining star of economic recovery innovation.

All content is copyright their rightful owner. Republication of PSFK content should be properly credited (and linked to) as the source, including our URL: psfk.com. Consult other content owners directly about republication of their content.

Friends and partners:

bench_craft_company

Web type <b>news</b>: iPhone and iPad now support TrueType font embedding <b>...</b>

This is also exciting news, as TrueType fonts are superior to SVG fonts in two very important ways: the files sizes are dramatically smaller (an especially important factor on mobile devices), and the rendering quality is much higher. ...

New Dragon Age 2 character unveiled <b>News</b> - Page 1 | Eurogamer.net

Read our news of New Dragon Age 2 character unveiled.

No Batmobile in Arkham City <b>News</b> - Page 1 | Eurogamer.net

Read our news of No Batmobile in Arkham City. ... Batman: Arkham Asylum 2 teaser 14 December, 2009. Latest News. Batman: Arkham City details emerge . Batman: Arkham City revealed, dated . Batman domains name Arkham sequel? ...

bench_craft_company

Web type <b>news</b>: iPhone and iPad now support TrueType font embedding <b>...</b>

This is also exciting news, as TrueType fonts are superior to SVG fonts in two very important ways: the files sizes are dramatically smaller (an especially important factor on mobile devices), and the rendering quality is much higher. ...

New Dragon Age 2 character unveiled <b>News</b> - Page 1 | Eurogamer.net

Read our news of New Dragon Age 2 character unveiled.

No Batmobile in Arkham City <b>News</b> - Page 1 | Eurogamer.net

Read our news of No Batmobile in Arkham City. ... Batman: Arkham Asylum 2 teaser 14 December, 2009. Latest News. Batman: Arkham City details emerge . Batman: Arkham City revealed, dated . Batman domains name Arkham sequel? ...

bench_craft_company

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<b>News</b> Corp developing a tablet-exclusive publication

News Corp Logo Reuters is reporting that News Corp, the world's third-largest media conglomerate, has confirmed they will be releasing a news publication developed specifically for tablet computers like the iPad. "It's a tablet-only ...

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Read our PlayStation 3 news of GT5 installs while played - Sony.

Photos Implant &#39;Memories&#39; of Fictional <b>News</b> Events | Smart <b>...</b>

Participants in a study were far more likely to “remember” a fictional news event when a headline was accompanied by a tangentially relevant photograph.

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bench craft company rip off

<b>News</b> Corp developing a tablet-exclusive publication

News Corp Logo Reuters is reporting that News Corp, the world's third-largest media conglomerate, has confirmed they will be releasing a news publication developed specifically for tablet computers like the iPad. "It's a tablet-only ...

GT5 installs while played - Sony PlayStation 3 <b>News</b> - Page 1 <b>...</b>

Read our PlayStation 3 news of GT5 installs while played - Sony.

Photos Implant &#39;Memories&#39; of Fictional <b>News</b> Events | Smart <b>...</b>

Participants in a study were far more likely to “remember” a fictional news event when a headline was accompanied by a tangentially relevant photograph.

bench craft company rip off

<b>News</b> Corp developing a tablet-exclusive publication

News Corp Logo Reuters is reporting that News Corp, the world's third-largest media conglomerate, has confirmed they will be releasing a news publication developed specifically for tablet computers like the iPad. "It's a tablet-only ...

GT5 installs while played - Sony PlayStation 3 <b>News</b> - Page 1 <b>...</b>

Read our PlayStation 3 news of GT5 installs while played - Sony.

Photos Implant &#39;Memories&#39; of Fictional <b>News</b> Events | Smart <b>...</b>

Participants in a study were far more likely to “remember” a fictional news event when a headline was accompanied by a tangentially relevant photograph.

bench craft company rip off

<b>News</b> Corp developing a tablet-exclusive publication

News Corp Logo Reuters is reporting that News Corp, the world's third-largest media conglomerate, has confirmed they will be releasing a news publication developed specifically for tablet computers like the iPad. "It's a tablet-only ...

GT5 installs while played - Sony PlayStation 3 <b>News</b> - Page 1 <b>...</b>

Read our PlayStation 3 news of GT5 installs while played - Sony.

Photos Implant &#39;Memories&#39; of Fictional <b>News</b> Events | Smart <b>...</b>

Participants in a study were far more likely to “remember” a fictional news event when a headline was accompanied by a tangentially relevant photograph.

bench craft company rip off

<b>News</b> Corp developing a tablet-exclusive publication

News Corp Logo Reuters is reporting that News Corp, the world's third-largest media conglomerate, has confirmed they will be releasing a news publication developed specifically for tablet computers like the iPad. "It's a tablet-only ...

GT5 installs while played - Sony PlayStation 3 <b>News</b> - Page 1 <b>...</b>

Read our PlayStation 3 news of GT5 installs while played - Sony.

Photos Implant &#39;Memories&#39; of Fictional <b>News</b> Events | Smart <b>...</b>

Participants in a study were far more likely to “remember” a fictional news event when a headline was accompanied by a tangentially relevant photograph.

bench craft company rip off

bench craft company rip off
bench craft company rip off

<b>News</b> Corp developing a tablet-exclusive publication

News Corp Logo Reuters is reporting that News Corp, the world's third-largest media conglomerate, has confirmed they will be releasing a news publication developed specifically for tablet computers like the iPad. "It's a tablet-only ...

GT5 installs while played - Sony PlayStation 3 <b>News</b> - Page 1 <b>...</b>

Read our PlayStation 3 news of GT5 installs while played - Sony.

Photos Implant &#39;Memories&#39; of Fictional <b>News</b> Events | Smart <b>...</b>

Participants in a study were far more likely to “remember” a fictional news event when a headline was accompanied by a tangentially relevant photograph.

bench craft company rip off

bench craft company rip off

<b>News</b> Corp developing a tablet-exclusive publication

News Corp Logo Reuters is reporting that News Corp, the world's third-largest media conglomerate, has confirmed they will be releasing a news publication developed specifically for tablet computers like the iPad. "It's a tablet-only ...

GT5 installs while played - Sony PlayStation 3 <b>News</b> - Page 1 <b>...</b>

Read our PlayStation 3 news of GT5 installs while played - Sony.

Photos Implant &#39;Memories&#39; of Fictional <b>News</b> Events | Smart <b>...</b>

Participants in a study were far more likely to “remember” a fictional news event when a headline was accompanied by a tangentially relevant photograph.

bench craft company rip off

<b>News</b> Corp developing a tablet-exclusive publication

News Corp Logo Reuters is reporting that News Corp, the world's third-largest media conglomerate, has confirmed they will be releasing a news publication developed specifically for tablet computers like the iPad. "It's a tablet-only ...

GT5 installs while played - Sony PlayStation 3 <b>News</b> - Page 1 <b>...</b>

Read our PlayStation 3 news of GT5 installs while played - Sony.

Photos Implant &#39;Memories&#39; of Fictional <b>News</b> Events | Smart <b>...</b>

Participants in a study were far more likely to “remember” a fictional news event when a headline was accompanied by a tangentially relevant photograph.

bench craft company rip off

Small Business <b>News</b>: Questions For Your Business

Everybody has questions when going into or running a business...everybody. If you have some burning inqueries you'd like to get answered, read our small.

Photos Implant &#39;Memories&#39; of Fictional <b>News</b> Events | Smart <b>...</b>

Participants in a study were far more likely to “remember” a fictional news event when a headline was accompanied by a tangentially relevant photograph.

Good <b>news</b>: James Bond and Indiana Jones hooking up to fight aliens <b>...</b>

Good news: James Bond and Indiana Jones hooking up to fight aliens.

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Police <b>News</b> at Steven Landsburg | The Big Questions: Tackling the <b>...</b>

1 Tweets that mention Police News at Steven Landsburg | The Big Questions: Tackling the Problems of Philosophy with Ideas from Mathematics, Economics, and Physics -- Topsy.com. Pingback on Nov 19th, 2010 at 3:23 am. 2 Police News at ...

EA launching Facebook golf game PC <b>News</b> - Page 1 | Eurogamer.net

Read our PC news of EA launching Facebook golf game.

Good <b>news</b>: James Bond and Indiana Jones hooking up to fight aliens <b>...</b>

Good news: James Bond and Indiana Jones hooking up to fight aliens.

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Photos Implant &#39;Memories&#39; of Fictional <b>News</b> Events | Smart <b>...</b>

Participants in a study were far more likely to “remember” a fictional news event when a headline was accompanied by a tangentially relevant photograph.

GT5 installs while played - Sony PlayStation 3 <b>News</b> - Page 1 <b>...</b>

Read our PlayStation 3 news of GT5 installs while played - Sony.

Fox <b>News</b> President: Jon Stewart Is Crazy And NPR Is Run By Nazis <b>...</b>

The second part of The Daily Beast's interview with Fox News president Roger Ailes is out today, and Ailes' encore doesn't disappoint. He responded harshly to Jon Stewart's pervasive criticism of cable news and had some tough, ...

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Making Money Work

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eric seiger

Fox <b>News</b> Decoded - Swampland - TIME.com

What do you do to amp ratings after you've won a big victory at the polls and the public has wandered off to start celebrating the holidays? At Fox News, the answer is obvious: you up the ante.

Small Business <b>News</b>: Direct Marketing Diorama

Not too long ago, we received a comment from a reader of our Small Business Trends small business news roundups on a post called Marketing Mashup. Though we.

Ominous Colts Injury <b>News</b> From Phil Wilson UPDATE Collie Cleared <b>...</b>

Phil Wilson Tweets some ominous news on the injury front for the Colts.

eric seiger

eric seiger

Fox <b>News</b> Decoded - Swampland - TIME.com

What do you do to amp ratings after you've won a big victory at the polls and the public has wandered off to start celebrating the holidays? At Fox News, the answer is obvious: you up the ante.

Small Business <b>News</b>: Direct Marketing Diorama

Not too long ago, we received a comment from a reader of our Small Business Trends small business news roundups on a post called Marketing Mashup. Though we.

Ominous Colts Injury <b>News</b> From Phil Wilson UPDATE Collie Cleared <b>...</b>

Phil Wilson Tweets some ominous news on the injury front for the Colts.

eric seiger

Fox <b>News</b> Decoded - Swampland - TIME.com

What do you do to amp ratings after you've won a big victory at the polls and the public has wandered off to start celebrating the holidays? At Fox News, the answer is obvious: you up the ante.

Small Business <b>News</b>: Direct Marketing Diorama

Not too long ago, we received a comment from a reader of our Small Business Trends small business news roundups on a post called Marketing Mashup. Though we.

Ominous Colts Injury <b>News</b> From Phil Wilson UPDATE Collie Cleared <b>...</b>

Phil Wilson Tweets some ominous news on the injury front for the Colts.

eric seiger

Fox <b>News</b> Decoded - Swampland - TIME.com

What do you do to amp ratings after you've won a big victory at the polls and the public has wandered off to start celebrating the holidays? At Fox News, the answer is obvious: you up the ante.

Small Business <b>News</b>: Direct Marketing Diorama

Not too long ago, we received a comment from a reader of our Small Business Trends small business news roundups on a post called Marketing Mashup. Though we.

Ominous Colts Injury <b>News</b> From Phil Wilson UPDATE Collie Cleared <b>...</b>

Phil Wilson Tweets some ominous news on the injury front for the Colts.

eric seiger
eric seiger

eric seiger
eric seiger

Fox <b>News</b> Decoded - Swampland - TIME.com

What do you do to amp ratings after you've won a big victory at the polls and the public has wandered off to start celebrating the holidays? At Fox News, the answer is obvious: you up the ante.

Small Business <b>News</b>: Direct Marketing Diorama

Not too long ago, we received a comment from a reader of our Small Business Trends small business news roundups on a post called Marketing Mashup. Though we.

Ominous Colts Injury <b>News</b> From Phil Wilson UPDATE Collie Cleared <b>...</b>

Phil Wilson Tweets some ominous news on the injury front for the Colts.

managing your personal finance

A survey released today by Javelin Strategy & Research, which serves financial institutions, found in August that nearly one in five Americans doesn't monitor or manage their personal finances. That rate is double what it was just a year ago. Despite the fact the recession has made it more important than ever to carefully track our money, when it comes to personal finances, 19% of Americans stuck their head in the sand. A year before, another survey had the figure at just 8%.



More anxiety-induced news: The percentage of Americans who say they sometimes log onto their checking account balances with their banks' websites dropped to 46%, down 13 points from 59% a year ago. Even those who track their money by pen and paper dropped, from 50% to 46%.




"It's a natural human reaction to stress: 'Maybe if I don't look at it, it will go away.'" explains the study's co-author, senior analyst Mark Schwanhausser. "I think you have fewer people checking their finances online because they don't like what they're seeing. 'I'm going to be a financial sleepwalker. I'm not going to look.'"



Schwanhausser's prescription for the problem involves convincing America's major financial institutions that they're doing a lousy job helping make it easier and less stressful for their customers to track their money. "It's not enough to tell you how to fix the toilet," he says. "You've got to have the wrench."



Yet despite the fact that most Americans' money resides at a bank, few banks are interested in furnishing financial planning tools. Right now, Schwanhausser argues, most people are required to log into a wide variety of websites to track their money. For example, 75% of Americans who have a credit card get it from somewhere other than their primary bank, meaning their finances are scattered across many websites, unreconciled.



When people do turn to their bank's websites, he argues, the financial planning tools are nearly non-existent despite the fact our society increasingly demands greater personal control through technology. "Today's online banking is like having avocado green appliances from the 1970s. It just doesn't cut it," says Schwanhausser.



Schwanhausser is using the survey to convince banks that it will actually endear customers to them if they put personal finance tools front and center on their sites, helping customers paint a clear picture of their own financial habits. He's pressing them to develop systems, both on the Web and through mobile apps, that can draw in customers' information from other sites, such as credit cards and mortgage lenders, so financial care-taking can be a one-stop process.



So far, banks and lenders have been slow to use existing technology to make money management a less daunting chore. Part of the issue is that many banks don't want to acknowledge competitors by drawing in account balances from elsewhere. Banks also stand to make money off poor financial planning through penalties and fees. Like a doctor who makes money off treating disease, promoting financial good health does not on the surface appear to be in a bank's best interest.



"You can't manage what you don't measure," says Schwanhausser. "And if the bank's not going to provide it for you, you have to go get it in other places."



He recommends existing aggregators such as Mint.com, which pulls your data from multiple sources and lays it out in spreadsheets and in spending plans, as a model for what all the banks should be doing for their customers.



He also notes that Bank of America's "My Portfolio" and Wells Fargo's "My Savings Plan" are two fledgling, if little-known, bank-created features that are slowly reaching toward the sort of comprehensive personal finance planning features he advocates.



As long as it remains difficult or scary, though, when it comes to their finances, Americans will remain more likely to use the Ostrich Method.

Are you an entrepreneur, solo business owner or freelancer? Are you keen to get regular business advice but don’t have the time to work out which blogs to subscribe to? Well, we’ve done the research for you.

Here’s a collection of business blogs aimed at entrepreneurs and small businesses. These have been chosen for their insights, advice, presentation and overall appeal to business people. Hopefully you’ll find these blogs cover all the business management advice and business trends analysis for your needs.

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1. Harvard Business Review

Harvard Business Review is a staple in any entrepreneur blog collection. The blog delivers timely business analysis and professional management advice.

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2. Young Entrepreneur

When you’re just starting our with your business venture, things can be a little tough. Young Entrepreneur focuses on the things you’ll need to know – financing, bootstrapping, identifying opportunities and making sales.

style="text-align: center;">

3. 64 Notes

64 Notes gets straight to the nuggets of gold by bypassing straightforward management tips and filling each post with those eye-opening things that change your business from alright to amazing. They also write a lot about how to avoid being the start-up that failed.

style="text-align: center;">

4. The Personal MBA

The Personal MBA is a blog dedicated to teaching all the tips and tricks you would have learned if you had done a degree in business. It recommends books, summarises books and draws on advice given freely by great minds in business. If you follow this blog you will learn a great deal about managing your business.

style="text-align: center;">

5. Instigator Blog

Instigator Blog is a very insightful blog, mainly discussing thoughts relevant to small business and entrepreneurs, written by an entrepreneur as he works on his business.

style="text-align: center;">

6. Fast Company

Fast Company is a major business blog, covering business news and trends. It’s vital information if you want to know where business is heading.

style="text-align: center;">

7. Entrepreneur Blog

Entrepreneur Blog is a site dedicated to providing business insights to entrepreneurs. It will analyse business failures, successes and trends, while offering sensible advice for any business owner.

style="text-align: center;">

8. The Entrepreneurial Mind

The Entrepreneurial Mind is a business blog written by a Belmont University professor of Entrepreneurship. His academic insight into the world of the entrepreneur is a great balance to the news and trends offered by other blogs.

style="text-align: center;">

9. Creative Web Biz

Creative Web Biz is a great blog for all the artistic entrepreneurs out there. This is a place for those people who are entrepreneurs, but don’t much care for all the business management advice and trends. This blog is entirely focused on how to get that art out there and sold. Highly recommended for musicians, artists, and makers of other crafts.

style="text-align: center;">

10. Work Happy

Work Happy is a blog offering advice for anyone in business for themselves. It’s useful for freelancers, small business owners and entrepreneurs alike. It features a lot of video presentations from entrepreneurs to keep things interesting.

style="text-align: center;">

Bonus: Entrepreneurship Interviews

Entrepreneurship Interviews added itself on to the list by being a wealth of information in the form of interviews with entrepreneurs. It’s not much to look at, but there is a lot to be gained by listening to what other entrepreneurs say candidly about their own business ventures.

More Blogs

If you’re keen to see some more great blog lists from MakeUseOf, read on:

• Four Best Inspiring Blogs Every Life Hacker Should Subscribe To
• 3 Personal Finance Blogs That Will Get You Out Of Debt
• The 10 Most Stunning Photo Blogs
• 6 Best Web Design Blogs To Follow
• The 6 Best Blogs For Architectural & Interior Design Ideas

If you know of other great blogs for business people, let us know in the comments!

Image Credit: Shutterstock

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360-exclusive Fallout: NV DLC revealed Xbox 360 <b>News</b> - Page 1 <b>...</b>

Read our Xbox 360 news of 360-exclusive Fallout: NV DLC revealed.

Lujiazui Breakfast: <b>News</b> And Views About China Stocks (Nov. 18 <b>...</b>

Investors and traders in China's main financial district are talking about the following before the start of trade today: Shanghai's main stock index fell 1.9% yesterday amid concerns about the impact of government efforts to slow down ...

BillBoard - Blogs - The Buffalo <b>News</b>

The Buffalo News updated every day with news from Buffalo, New York. Links to national and business news, entertainment listings, recipes, sports teams, classified ads, death notices.

360-exclusive Fallout: NV DLC revealed Xbox 360 <b>News</b> - Page 1 <b>...</b>

Read our Xbox 360 news of 360-exclusive Fallout: NV DLC revealed.

Lujiazui Breakfast: <b>News</b> And Views About China Stocks (Nov. 18 <b>...</b>

Investors and traders in China's main financial district are talking about the following before the start of trade today: Shanghai's main stock index fell 1.9% yesterday amid concerns about the impact of government efforts to slow down ...

BillBoard - Blogs - The Buffalo <b>News</b>

The Buffalo News updated every day with news from Buffalo, New York. Links to national and business news, entertainment listings, recipes, sports teams, classified ads, death notices.

alpine payment systems scam

360-exclusive Fallout: NV DLC revealed Xbox 360 <b>News</b> - Page 1 <b>...</b>

Read our Xbox 360 news of 360-exclusive Fallout: NV DLC revealed.

Lujiazui Breakfast: <b>News</b> And Views About China Stocks (Nov. 18 <b>...</b>

Investors and traders in China's main financial district are talking about the following before the start of trade today: Shanghai's main stock index fell 1.9% yesterday amid concerns about the impact of government efforts to slow down ...

BillBoard - Blogs - The Buffalo <b>News</b>

The Buffalo News updated every day with news from Buffalo, New York. Links to national and business news, entertainment listings, recipes, sports teams, classified ads, death notices.

Making Money on Line

Shattenkirk, on the other hand, is the Avalanche's top prospect, a player they invested a first round draft pick in during the 2007 NHL entry draft. He's only 21 years of age, so there will be defensive mistakes; but his poise with the puck in both zones makes him a no brainer to keep on the roster.

And after all, isn't this team supposed to be rebuilding? There's no sense in depriving a great young player of quality ice time in favor of a lesser skilled player just because that player has is older or makes more money.

Of the defense, the jobs of Scott Hannan, Adam Foote, the recently acquired Ryan O'Byrne, and John-Michael Liles—aka the second coming of Scott Neidermayer—appear to be safe.

Kyle Cumiskey is a favorite of Sacco's, regularly leading the team in ice time before his injury. However, it can be argued that Cumiskey was used so frequently because of his skating and puck control abilities, both of which—as well as his questionable decision making with the puck—are inferior to that of Shattenkirk, who Sacco has shown faith in.

Ryan Wilson has had a fairly decent season given his skill set, but the acquisition of O'Byrne—who's played a larger role than Wilson in his first three games with the Avalanche—makes one wonder if Wilson will have a secured spot on the line-up.

Lastly, we come to Kyle Quincey. A great start to his Avalanche career has deteriorated from good, to bad, to awful since winter last season. To make matters worse, over the summer the Avalanche re-signed him to a two year contract which averages over 3 million dollars a season.

But money should be irrelevant. His play has been noticeably bad this season, and he hasn't earned a spot on the defense.

If Sacco goes with the guys who have played the best in 2010-2011, he'll end up with a defense of Liles, O'Byrne, Hannan, Holos, Foote, and Shattenkirk.

After the success the Arabnet event held earlier this year, the organizers have come back with a new ‘hands on’ approach to getting businesses launched in the region. They’re going on through Arab cities on a roadshow for entrepreneurs.

Not unlike your traditional roadshow, they plan on putting on some interesting performances for all those interested in attending. It appears what happens in Beirut doesn’t simply stay in Beirut after all.

A blog post they put up recently states that they’ll be on the road for 3 weeks during December on for a hunt for the region’s most promising talent in Syria, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, the UAE, and Egypt.

It’s founder Omar Christidis said after the success they had with their Beirut Workshop on Entrepreneurship which attracted an audience from Lebanon, Jordan, and Syria attracting over 170 people.

We had a sit down with Christidis during the Celebration of Entrepreneurship last week to ask him about the roadshow. Here’s what he had to say:

TNW: Why are a roadshow?

Our moto is Find, Train, and Inspire (like that of Wamda‘s).

• Find: talented entrepreneurs wherever they might be


• Train: We want to train them by giving them a practical perspective on entrepreneurship through real stories and successes


• Inspire: By bringing role models in so people can see success stories first hand

So we’re talking about a lawyer giving some advice on corporation, an investor giving them advice on fund raising, an experienced entrepreneur who can talk to them about growing a business growing a product line and hiring employees, business consult structuring their ideas, and a business leader who can tell them what direction to put their startups in.

TNW: What’s in it for Arabnet?

We’re not going to be making much money off of this, we’re doing it to make to Arabnet better.

We found a lot of Entrepreneurs this year [during the event], but we can’t expect them all to come to us, so we’re going to go to them. We’re looking for local sponsors in each city to help get entrepreneurs to the event. It costs a lot to get to the event depending on where your from.

We want to find local partners in each city to help fly entrepreneurs in. If we can do that, we can help even more people launch.

We think it’s great to help entrepreneurs launch in the region, although a bit skeptical on how much they can accomplish going on a roadshow with all the resources that implies instead of say, launch the same workshop online.

Time will tell just how successful it’ll be by both the size of next year’s Arabnet and how many companies actually launch as a result of it. Either way, we’re excited to see energy levels reach a higher level next year. 2011 looks like its going to be the year of Entrepreneurs in the Middle East.

bench craft company scam

Small Business <b>News</b>: New Business Rules

The rules for business keep changing but a few things stay the same. First impressions matter, technology keeps changing the game and costs keep rising as.

Energy Drinks Linked to Alcohol Problems - Health <b>News</b> - Health.com

College students who consume nonalcoholic energy drinks such as Red Bull at least once a week are more than twice as likely as their peers to show signs of alcohol dependence, according to a new study.

Denver Broncos <b>News</b>: Horse Tracks - 11/17/10 - Mile High Report

Your Daily Cup of Orange and Blue Coffee .. Horse Tracks.

bench craft company scam

Shattenkirk, on the other hand, is the Avalanche's top prospect, a player they invested a first round draft pick in during the 2007 NHL entry draft. He's only 21 years of age, so there will be defensive mistakes; but his poise with the puck in both zones makes him a no brainer to keep on the roster.

And after all, isn't this team supposed to be rebuilding? There's no sense in depriving a great young player of quality ice time in favor of a lesser skilled player just because that player has is older or makes more money.

Of the defense, the jobs of Scott Hannan, Adam Foote, the recently acquired Ryan O'Byrne, and John-Michael Liles—aka the second coming of Scott Neidermayer—appear to be safe.

Kyle Cumiskey is a favorite of Sacco's, regularly leading the team in ice time before his injury. However, it can be argued that Cumiskey was used so frequently because of his skating and puck control abilities, both of which—as well as his questionable decision making with the puck—are inferior to that of Shattenkirk, who Sacco has shown faith in.

Ryan Wilson has had a fairly decent season given his skill set, but the acquisition of O'Byrne—who's played a larger role than Wilson in his first three games with the Avalanche—makes one wonder if Wilson will have a secured spot on the line-up.

Lastly, we come to Kyle Quincey. A great start to his Avalanche career has deteriorated from good, to bad, to awful since winter last season. To make matters worse, over the summer the Avalanche re-signed him to a two year contract which averages over 3 million dollars a season.

But money should be irrelevant. His play has been noticeably bad this season, and he hasn't earned a spot on the defense.

If Sacco goes with the guys who have played the best in 2010-2011, he'll end up with a defense of Liles, O'Byrne, Hannan, Holos, Foote, and Shattenkirk.

After the success the Arabnet event held earlier this year, the organizers have come back with a new ‘hands on’ approach to getting businesses launched in the region. They’re going on through Arab cities on a roadshow for entrepreneurs.

Not unlike your traditional roadshow, they plan on putting on some interesting performances for all those interested in attending. It appears what happens in Beirut doesn’t simply stay in Beirut after all.

A blog post they put up recently states that they’ll be on the road for 3 weeks during December on for a hunt for the region’s most promising talent in Syria, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, the UAE, and Egypt.

It’s founder Omar Christidis said after the success they had with their Beirut Workshop on Entrepreneurship which attracted an audience from Lebanon, Jordan, and Syria attracting over 170 people.

We had a sit down with Christidis during the Celebration of Entrepreneurship last week to ask him about the roadshow. Here’s what he had to say:

TNW: Why are a roadshow?

Our moto is Find, Train, and Inspire (like that of Wamda‘s).

• Find: talented entrepreneurs wherever they might be


• Train: We want to train them by giving them a practical perspective on entrepreneurship through real stories and successes


• Inspire: By bringing role models in so people can see success stories first hand

So we’re talking about a lawyer giving some advice on corporation, an investor giving them advice on fund raising, an experienced entrepreneur who can talk to them about growing a business growing a product line and hiring employees, business consult structuring their ideas, and a business leader who can tell them what direction to put their startups in.

TNW: What’s in it for Arabnet?

We’re not going to be making much money off of this, we’re doing it to make to Arabnet better.

We found a lot of Entrepreneurs this year [during the event], but we can’t expect them all to come to us, so we’re going to go to them. We’re looking for local sponsors in each city to help get entrepreneurs to the event. It costs a lot to get to the event depending on where your from.

We want to find local partners in each city to help fly entrepreneurs in. If we can do that, we can help even more people launch.

We think it’s great to help entrepreneurs launch in the region, although a bit skeptical on how much they can accomplish going on a roadshow with all the resources that implies instead of say, launch the same workshop online.

Time will tell just how successful it’ll be by both the size of next year’s Arabnet and how many companies actually launch as a result of it. Either way, we’re excited to see energy levels reach a higher level next year. 2011 looks like its going to be the year of Entrepreneurs in the Middle East.

bench craft company scam

Small Business <b>News</b>: New Business Rules

The rules for business keep changing but a few things stay the same. First impressions matter, technology keeps changing the game and costs keep rising as.

Energy Drinks Linked to Alcohol Problems - Health <b>News</b> - Health.com

College students who consume nonalcoholic energy drinks such as Red Bull at least once a week are more than twice as likely as their peers to show signs of alcohol dependence, according to a new study.

Denver Broncos <b>News</b>: Horse Tracks - 11/17/10 - Mile High Report

Your Daily Cup of Orange and Blue Coffee .. Horse Tracks.

benchcraft company scam

bench craft company scam

benchcraft company scam

Small Business <b>News</b>: New Business Rules

The rules for business keep changing but a few things stay the same. First impressions matter, technology keeps changing the game and costs keep rising as.

Energy Drinks Linked to Alcohol Problems - Health <b>News</b> - Health.com

College students who consume nonalcoholic energy drinks such as Red Bull at least once a week are more than twice as likely as their peers to show signs of alcohol dependence, according to a new study.

Denver Broncos <b>News</b>: Horse Tracks - 11/17/10 - Mile High Report

Your Daily Cup of Orange and Blue Coffee .. Horse Tracks.

bench craft company scam

Shattenkirk, on the other hand, is the Avalanche's top prospect, a player they invested a first round draft pick in during the 2007 NHL entry draft. He's only 21 years of age, so there will be defensive mistakes; but his poise with the puck in both zones makes him a no brainer to keep on the roster.

And after all, isn't this team supposed to be rebuilding? There's no sense in depriving a great young player of quality ice time in favor of a lesser skilled player just because that player has is older or makes more money.

Of the defense, the jobs of Scott Hannan, Adam Foote, the recently acquired Ryan O'Byrne, and John-Michael Liles—aka the second coming of Scott Neidermayer—appear to be safe.

Kyle Cumiskey is a favorite of Sacco's, regularly leading the team in ice time before his injury. However, it can be argued that Cumiskey was used so frequently because of his skating and puck control abilities, both of which—as well as his questionable decision making with the puck—are inferior to that of Shattenkirk, who Sacco has shown faith in.

Ryan Wilson has had a fairly decent season given his skill set, but the acquisition of O'Byrne—who's played a larger role than Wilson in his first three games with the Avalanche—makes one wonder if Wilson will have a secured spot on the line-up.

Lastly, we come to Kyle Quincey. A great start to his Avalanche career has deteriorated from good, to bad, to awful since winter last season. To make matters worse, over the summer the Avalanche re-signed him to a two year contract which averages over 3 million dollars a season.

But money should be irrelevant. His play has been noticeably bad this season, and he hasn't earned a spot on the defense.

If Sacco goes with the guys who have played the best in 2010-2011, he'll end up with a defense of Liles, O'Byrne, Hannan, Holos, Foote, and Shattenkirk.

After the success the Arabnet event held earlier this year, the organizers have come back with a new ‘hands on’ approach to getting businesses launched in the region. They’re going on through Arab cities on a roadshow for entrepreneurs.

Not unlike your traditional roadshow, they plan on putting on some interesting performances for all those interested in attending. It appears what happens in Beirut doesn’t simply stay in Beirut after all.

A blog post they put up recently states that they’ll be on the road for 3 weeks during December on for a hunt for the region’s most promising talent in Syria, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, the UAE, and Egypt.

It’s founder Omar Christidis said after the success they had with their Beirut Workshop on Entrepreneurship which attracted an audience from Lebanon, Jordan, and Syria attracting over 170 people.

We had a sit down with Christidis during the Celebration of Entrepreneurship last week to ask him about the roadshow. Here’s what he had to say:

TNW: Why are a roadshow?

Our moto is Find, Train, and Inspire (like that of Wamda‘s).

• Find: talented entrepreneurs wherever they might be


• Train: We want to train them by giving them a practical perspective on entrepreneurship through real stories and successes


• Inspire: By bringing role models in so people can see success stories first hand

So we’re talking about a lawyer giving some advice on corporation, an investor giving them advice on fund raising, an experienced entrepreneur who can talk to them about growing a business growing a product line and hiring employees, business consult structuring their ideas, and a business leader who can tell them what direction to put their startups in.

TNW: What’s in it for Arabnet?

We’re not going to be making much money off of this, we’re doing it to make to Arabnet better.

We found a lot of Entrepreneurs this year [during the event], but we can’t expect them all to come to us, so we’re going to go to them. We’re looking for local sponsors in each city to help get entrepreneurs to the event. It costs a lot to get to the event depending on where your from.

We want to find local partners in each city to help fly entrepreneurs in. If we can do that, we can help even more people launch.

We think it’s great to help entrepreneurs launch in the region, although a bit skeptical on how much they can accomplish going on a roadshow with all the resources that implies instead of say, launch the same workshop online.

Time will tell just how successful it’ll be by both the size of next year’s Arabnet and how many companies actually launch as a result of it. Either way, we’re excited to see energy levels reach a higher level next year. 2011 looks like its going to be the year of Entrepreneurs in the Middle East.

bench craft company scam

bench craft company scam

Small Business <b>News</b>: New Business Rules

The rules for business keep changing but a few things stay the same. First impressions matter, technology keeps changing the game and costs keep rising as.

Energy Drinks Linked to Alcohol Problems - Health <b>News</b> - Health.com

College students who consume nonalcoholic energy drinks such as Red Bull at least once a week are more than twice as likely as their peers to show signs of alcohol dependence, according to a new study.

Denver Broncos <b>News</b>: Horse Tracks - 11/17/10 - Mile High Report

Your Daily Cup of Orange and Blue Coffee .. Horse Tracks.

benchcraft company scam

benchcraft company scam

Small Business <b>News</b>: New Business Rules

The rules for business keep changing but a few things stay the same. First impressions matter, technology keeps changing the game and costs keep rising as.

Energy Drinks Linked to Alcohol Problems - Health <b>News</b> - Health.com

College students who consume nonalcoholic energy drinks such as Red Bull at least once a week are more than twice as likely as their peers to show signs of alcohol dependence, according to a new study.

Denver Broncos <b>News</b>: Horse Tracks - 11/17/10 - Mile High Report

Your Daily Cup of Orange and Blue Coffee .. Horse Tracks.

benchcraft company scam

Small Business <b>News</b>: New Business Rules

The rules for business keep changing but a few things stay the same. First impressions matter, technology keeps changing the game and costs keep rising as.

Energy Drinks Linked to Alcohol Problems - Health <b>News</b> - Health.com

College students who consume nonalcoholic energy drinks such as Red Bull at least once a week are more than twice as likely as their peers to show signs of alcohol dependence, according to a new study.

Denver Broncos <b>News</b>: Horse Tracks - 11/17/10 - Mile High Report

Your Daily Cup of Orange and Blue Coffee .. Horse Tracks.

benchcraft company scam

Small Business <b>News</b>: New Business Rules

The rules for business keep changing but a few things stay the same. First impressions matter, technology keeps changing the game and costs keep rising as.

Energy Drinks Linked to Alcohol Problems - Health <b>News</b> - Health.com

College students who consume nonalcoholic energy drinks such as Red Bull at least once a week are more than twice as likely as their peers to show signs of alcohol dependence, according to a new study.

Denver Broncos <b>News</b>: Horse Tracks - 11/17/10 - Mile High Report

Your Daily Cup of Orange and Blue Coffee .. Horse Tracks.

how to lose weight fast bench craft company scam
bench craft company scam

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Secrets to Making Money

Your daily dose of news and tidbits from the world of money in politics:

DEMOCRATS MORE LIKELY TO PERSONALLY ATTACK OPPONENTS IN ADVERTISEMENTS: According to a recent report by the Wesleyan Media Project, in 2010, �pro-Democratic ads focused on the personal characteristics of Republican candidates in 21 percent of their attack ads� compared to 11 percent of pro-Republican ads. This is up from the 12 percent of Democratic attack ads in 2008 that were focused on personal characteristics. 

The report cautions against claims that this election is unusually negative stating the proportion of negative to positive ads is comparable to 2008. However, the big difference is that among negative ads there is an increase among personal attack ads. Overall, that rate has gone up from 14 percent in 2008 to 20 percent in 2010. The report also mentions that attack ads �are far more likely than other ads to be sponsored by parties and/or interest groups� rather than by candidates themselves.

When making independent expenditures with overt messages in favor or opposition to federal candidates, political groups must tell the Federal Election Commission whether their expenditure is to �support� a candidate or �oppose� a candidate. A Center for Responsive Politics analysis of outside groups� expenditures �opposing� candidates compared to ads �supporting� candidates since October 1st shows �opposing ads� totaling $218 million and supporting ads totaling $42 million. These expenditures include TV ads, radio ads, web ads, fliers, mailings, canvassers, phone banks and other communications:

REPUBLICAN RANKING MEMBERS ARE THE COOL KIDS ON THE BLOCK AGAIN:
Ranking members of House committees are becoming the popular kids. If
the Republicans take over majority in the House, committee ranking
members like Rep. David Camp (R-Mich.) will be the new chairmen. As the
New York Times reported Tuesday, Republicans in positions to become
chairmen of House committees are seeing an influx of cash and popularity
at fundraisers. Camp, the current ranking member of the tax-writing
House Ways and Means Committee is receiving more contributions as
lobbyists plan for the future.



Jennifer Bell, a former Senate Finance Committee aide and a current
health care lobbyist told the New York Times, �You don�t wait until Nov.
3 and say, �What is the plan?� Obviously, it is the majority that sets
the agenda.�



As OpenSecrets Blog reported yesterday, many industries have been
planning ahead and have started to shift contributions to Republicans.
This phenomenon is not unique to this election as contributions have
historically favored the majority party and have fluctuated accordingly.



Below is a Center for Responsive Politics analysis of contributions to
Camp that shows a sharp increase in contributions during the last three
months - through September 30th. The second chart shows the total contributions to all candidates
during the same period for a linear comparison:




U.S. FALLS OUT OF THE TOP 20 LEAST CORRUPT NATIONS LIST: Transparency International released their annual Corruption Perceptions Index on Tuesday revealing that the United States has dropped from the 19th least corrupt nation in 2009 to 22nd place this year. According to Reuters, Nancy Boswell, the President of TI in the United States stated that the United States has lost integrity and public faith about ethics in America due in part to the lending practices in the subprime crisis, �Bernard Madoff's Ponzi scheme and rows over political funding.�

On the bright side, the United States is perceived to be just less corrupt than Uruguay, France, Estonia and Slovenia.

Have a news tip or link to pass along? We want to hear from you! E-mail us at press@crp.org.

Facebook has one of the largest deployments of the open source database MySQL, and the techies responsible for the care and feeding of this installment will divulge some of their secrets tomorrow night at company headquarters. If you can’t make it down to the event in Palo Alto, you can watch a live webcast of it on Facebook Live.



The database houses essential information about the more than 500 million people who have accounts on the social network. With about half of the members logging on daily, the system is incredibly busy — understatement! So it’s hardly a surprise that Facebook has three different teams of techies caring for the SQL installation: operations, performance and engineering groups, to be exact.

The level of service that Facebook demands from this database calls for special tweaks. The social network has its own patch for MySQL and engineering team continues to upgrade this software. The evolution of this development will be part of the presentation tomorrow night.

Most open-source software comes in a free version, with more advanced ones costing money. MySQL  has three levels of paid subscriptions, and the most advanced one prices at $10,000 a year for one to four sockets. The most advanced one boasts the kinds of features that Facebook needs:

Whether you’re racing to introduce a new service, or trying to manage an avalanche of data in real time, your database has to be scalable, fast and highly available to meet ever-changing market conditions and stringent Service Level Agreements (SLAs).

MySQL Cluster is the industry’s only real-time transactional relational database combining 99.999% availability with the low Total Cost of Ownership (TCO) of open source. It features a “shared-nothing” distributed architecture with no single point of failure to assure high availability and performance, allowing you to meet your most demanding mission-critical application requirements.

MySQL Cluster’s real-time design delivers predictable, millisecond response times with the ability to service tens of thousands of transactions per second. Support for in-memory and disk based data, automatic data partitioning with load balancing and the ability to add nodes to a running cluster with zero downtime allows linear database scalability to handle the most unpredictable workloads.

MySQL Cluster delivers carrier-grade availability and performance, with the flexibility of open source software

MySQL Cluster eliminates the need for expensive shared storage, and runs on a range of commodity platforms, making it the most open and cost-effective database solution for mission critical applications.

The discussion of Facebook’s database deployment seems like the a brilliant response to news of the minor dip in Facebook’s availability rate this past quarter. The timing of the presentation couldn’t be better: this social network has a lot more demand put on it than much of the competition, and what better way is there to make the point than to lift up the hood?

eric seiger

Google <b>News</b> Blog: Credit where credit is due

News publishers and readers both benefit when journalists get proper credit for their work. That can be difficult, with news spreading so quickly and many websites syndicating articles to others. That's why we're experimenting with two ...

Obama 2012 - Doug Schoen - Fox <b>News</b> | Mediaite

Fox News' Democratic analysts have thrown President Obama under the bus: Doug Schoen and Pat Caddell suggested this weekend that the Democratic Party must cut off its head to stand a chance in 2012. Schoen was back on America Live ...

Great <b>news</b>: Dems ready to push amnesty during lame duck session <b>...</b>

Great news: Dems ready to push amnesty during lame duck session.

eric seiger

Your daily dose of news and tidbits from the world of money in politics:

DEMOCRATS MORE LIKELY TO PERSONALLY ATTACK OPPONENTS IN ADVERTISEMENTS: According to a recent report by the Wesleyan Media Project, in 2010, �pro-Democratic ads focused on the personal characteristics of Republican candidates in 21 percent of their attack ads� compared to 11 percent of pro-Republican ads. This is up from the 12 percent of Democratic attack ads in 2008 that were focused on personal characteristics. 

The report cautions against claims that this election is unusually negative stating the proportion of negative to positive ads is comparable to 2008. However, the big difference is that among negative ads there is an increase among personal attack ads. Overall, that rate has gone up from 14 percent in 2008 to 20 percent in 2010. The report also mentions that attack ads �are far more likely than other ads to be sponsored by parties and/or interest groups� rather than by candidates themselves.

When making independent expenditures with overt messages in favor or opposition to federal candidates, political groups must tell the Federal Election Commission whether their expenditure is to �support� a candidate or �oppose� a candidate. A Center for Responsive Politics analysis of outside groups� expenditures �opposing� candidates compared to ads �supporting� candidates since October 1st shows �opposing ads� totaling $218 million and supporting ads totaling $42 million. These expenditures include TV ads, radio ads, web ads, fliers, mailings, canvassers, phone banks and other communications:

REPUBLICAN RANKING MEMBERS ARE THE COOL KIDS ON THE BLOCK AGAIN:
Ranking members of House committees are becoming the popular kids. If
the Republicans take over majority in the House, committee ranking
members like Rep. David Camp (R-Mich.) will be the new chairmen. As the
New York Times reported Tuesday, Republicans in positions to become
chairmen of House committees are seeing an influx of cash and popularity
at fundraisers. Camp, the current ranking member of the tax-writing
House Ways and Means Committee is receiving more contributions as
lobbyists plan for the future.



Jennifer Bell, a former Senate Finance Committee aide and a current
health care lobbyist told the New York Times, �You don�t wait until Nov.
3 and say, �What is the plan?� Obviously, it is the majority that sets
the agenda.�



As OpenSecrets Blog reported yesterday, many industries have been
planning ahead and have started to shift contributions to Republicans.
This phenomenon is not unique to this election as contributions have
historically favored the majority party and have fluctuated accordingly.



Below is a Center for Responsive Politics analysis of contributions to
Camp that shows a sharp increase in contributions during the last three
months - through September 30th. The second chart shows the total contributions to all candidates
during the same period for a linear comparison:




U.S. FALLS OUT OF THE TOP 20 LEAST CORRUPT NATIONS LIST: Transparency International released their annual Corruption Perceptions Index on Tuesday revealing that the United States has dropped from the 19th least corrupt nation in 2009 to 22nd place this year. According to Reuters, Nancy Boswell, the President of TI in the United States stated that the United States has lost integrity and public faith about ethics in America due in part to the lending practices in the subprime crisis, �Bernard Madoff's Ponzi scheme and rows over political funding.�

On the bright side, the United States is perceived to be just less corrupt than Uruguay, France, Estonia and Slovenia.

Have a news tip or link to pass along? We want to hear from you! E-mail us at press@crp.org.

Facebook has one of the largest deployments of the open source database MySQL, and the techies responsible for the care and feeding of this installment will divulge some of their secrets tomorrow night at company headquarters. If you can’t make it down to the event in Palo Alto, you can watch a live webcast of it on Facebook Live.



The database houses essential information about the more than 500 million people who have accounts on the social network. With about half of the members logging on daily, the system is incredibly busy — understatement! So it’s hardly a surprise that Facebook has three different teams of techies caring for the SQL installation: operations, performance and engineering groups, to be exact.

The level of service that Facebook demands from this database calls for special tweaks. The social network has its own patch for MySQL and engineering team continues to upgrade this software. The evolution of this development will be part of the presentation tomorrow night.

Most open-source software comes in a free version, with more advanced ones costing money. MySQL  has three levels of paid subscriptions, and the most advanced one prices at $10,000 a year for one to four sockets. The most advanced one boasts the kinds of features that Facebook needs:

Whether you’re racing to introduce a new service, or trying to manage an avalanche of data in real time, your database has to be scalable, fast and highly available to meet ever-changing market conditions and stringent Service Level Agreements (SLAs).

MySQL Cluster is the industry’s only real-time transactional relational database combining 99.999% availability with the low Total Cost of Ownership (TCO) of open source. It features a “shared-nothing” distributed architecture with no single point of failure to assure high availability and performance, allowing you to meet your most demanding mission-critical application requirements.

MySQL Cluster’s real-time design delivers predictable, millisecond response times with the ability to service tens of thousands of transactions per second. Support for in-memory and disk based data, automatic data partitioning with load balancing and the ability to add nodes to a running cluster with zero downtime allows linear database scalability to handle the most unpredictable workloads.

MySQL Cluster delivers carrier-grade availability and performance, with the flexibility of open source software

MySQL Cluster eliminates the need for expensive shared storage, and runs on a range of commodity platforms, making it the most open and cost-effective database solution for mission critical applications.

The discussion of Facebook’s database deployment seems like the a brilliant response to news of the minor dip in Facebook’s availability rate this past quarter. The timing of the presentation couldn’t be better: this social network has a lot more demand put on it than much of the competition, and what better way is there to make the point than to lift up the hood?

eric seiger

Google <b>News</b> Blog: Credit where credit is due

News publishers and readers both benefit when journalists get proper credit for their work. That can be difficult, with news spreading so quickly and many websites syndicating articles to others. That's why we're experimenting with two ...

Obama 2012 - Doug Schoen - Fox <b>News</b> | Mediaite

Fox News' Democratic analysts have thrown President Obama under the bus: Doug Schoen and Pat Caddell suggested this weekend that the Democratic Party must cut off its head to stand a chance in 2012. Schoen was back on America Live ...

Great <b>news</b>: Dems ready to push amnesty during lame duck session <b>...</b>

Great news: Dems ready to push amnesty during lame duck session.

eric seiger

eric seiger

eric seiger

Google <b>News</b> Blog: Credit where credit is due

News publishers and readers both benefit when journalists get proper credit for their work. That can be difficult, with news spreading so quickly and many websites syndicating articles to others. That's why we're experimenting with two ...

Obama 2012 - Doug Schoen - Fox <b>News</b> | Mediaite

Fox News' Democratic analysts have thrown President Obama under the bus: Doug Schoen and Pat Caddell suggested this weekend that the Democratic Party must cut off its head to stand a chance in 2012. Schoen was back on America Live ...

Great <b>news</b>: Dems ready to push amnesty during lame duck session <b>...</b>

Great news: Dems ready to push amnesty during lame duck session.

eric seiger

Your daily dose of news and tidbits from the world of money in politics:

DEMOCRATS MORE LIKELY TO PERSONALLY ATTACK OPPONENTS IN ADVERTISEMENTS: According to a recent report by the Wesleyan Media Project, in 2010, �pro-Democratic ads focused on the personal characteristics of Republican candidates in 21 percent of their attack ads� compared to 11 percent of pro-Republican ads. This is up from the 12 percent of Democratic attack ads in 2008 that were focused on personal characteristics. 

The report cautions against claims that this election is unusually negative stating the proportion of negative to positive ads is comparable to 2008. However, the big difference is that among negative ads there is an increase among personal attack ads. Overall, that rate has gone up from 14 percent in 2008 to 20 percent in 2010. The report also mentions that attack ads �are far more likely than other ads to be sponsored by parties and/or interest groups� rather than by candidates themselves.

When making independent expenditures with overt messages in favor or opposition to federal candidates, political groups must tell the Federal Election Commission whether their expenditure is to �support� a candidate or �oppose� a candidate. A Center for Responsive Politics analysis of outside groups� expenditures �opposing� candidates compared to ads �supporting� candidates since October 1st shows �opposing ads� totaling $218 million and supporting ads totaling $42 million. These expenditures include TV ads, radio ads, web ads, fliers, mailings, canvassers, phone banks and other communications:

REPUBLICAN RANKING MEMBERS ARE THE COOL KIDS ON THE BLOCK AGAIN:
Ranking members of House committees are becoming the popular kids. If
the Republicans take over majority in the House, committee ranking
members like Rep. David Camp (R-Mich.) will be the new chairmen. As the
New York Times reported Tuesday, Republicans in positions to become
chairmen of House committees are seeing an influx of cash and popularity
at fundraisers. Camp, the current ranking member of the tax-writing
House Ways and Means Committee is receiving more contributions as
lobbyists plan for the future.



Jennifer Bell, a former Senate Finance Committee aide and a current
health care lobbyist told the New York Times, �You don�t wait until Nov.
3 and say, �What is the plan?� Obviously, it is the majority that sets
the agenda.�



As OpenSecrets Blog reported yesterday, many industries have been
planning ahead and have started to shift contributions to Republicans.
This phenomenon is not unique to this election as contributions have
historically favored the majority party and have fluctuated accordingly.



Below is a Center for Responsive Politics analysis of contributions to
Camp that shows a sharp increase in contributions during the last three
months - through September 30th. The second chart shows the total contributions to all candidates
during the same period for a linear comparison:




U.S. FALLS OUT OF THE TOP 20 LEAST CORRUPT NATIONS LIST: Transparency International released their annual Corruption Perceptions Index on Tuesday revealing that the United States has dropped from the 19th least corrupt nation in 2009 to 22nd place this year. According to Reuters, Nancy Boswell, the President of TI in the United States stated that the United States has lost integrity and public faith about ethics in America due in part to the lending practices in the subprime crisis, �Bernard Madoff's Ponzi scheme and rows over political funding.�

On the bright side, the United States is perceived to be just less corrupt than Uruguay, France, Estonia and Slovenia.

Have a news tip or link to pass along? We want to hear from you! E-mail us at press@crp.org.

Facebook has one of the largest deployments of the open source database MySQL, and the techies responsible for the care and feeding of this installment will divulge some of their secrets tomorrow night at company headquarters. If you can’t make it down to the event in Palo Alto, you can watch a live webcast of it on Facebook Live.



The database houses essential information about the more than 500 million people who have accounts on the social network. With about half of the members logging on daily, the system is incredibly busy — understatement! So it’s hardly a surprise that Facebook has three different teams of techies caring for the SQL installation: operations, performance and engineering groups, to be exact.

The level of service that Facebook demands from this database calls for special tweaks. The social network has its own patch for MySQL and engineering team continues to upgrade this software. The evolution of this development will be part of the presentation tomorrow night.

Most open-source software comes in a free version, with more advanced ones costing money. MySQL  has three levels of paid subscriptions, and the most advanced one prices at $10,000 a year for one to four sockets. The most advanced one boasts the kinds of features that Facebook needs:

Whether you’re racing to introduce a new service, or trying to manage an avalanche of data in real time, your database has to be scalable, fast and highly available to meet ever-changing market conditions and stringent Service Level Agreements (SLAs).

MySQL Cluster is the industry’s only real-time transactional relational database combining 99.999% availability with the low Total Cost of Ownership (TCO) of open source. It features a “shared-nothing” distributed architecture with no single point of failure to assure high availability and performance, allowing you to meet your most demanding mission-critical application requirements.

MySQL Cluster’s real-time design delivers predictable, millisecond response times with the ability to service tens of thousands of transactions per second. Support for in-memory and disk based data, automatic data partitioning with load balancing and the ability to add nodes to a running cluster with zero downtime allows linear database scalability to handle the most unpredictable workloads.

MySQL Cluster delivers carrier-grade availability and performance, with the flexibility of open source software

MySQL Cluster eliminates the need for expensive shared storage, and runs on a range of commodity platforms, making it the most open and cost-effective database solution for mission critical applications.

The discussion of Facebook’s database deployment seems like the a brilliant response to news of the minor dip in Facebook’s availability rate this past quarter. The timing of the presentation couldn’t be better: this social network has a lot more demand put on it than much of the competition, and what better way is there to make the point than to lift up the hood?

eric seiger

eric seiger

Google <b>News</b> Blog: Credit where credit is due

News publishers and readers both benefit when journalists get proper credit for their work. That can be difficult, with news spreading so quickly and many websites syndicating articles to others. That's why we're experimenting with two ...

Obama 2012 - Doug Schoen - Fox <b>News</b> | Mediaite

Fox News' Democratic analysts have thrown President Obama under the bus: Doug Schoen and Pat Caddell suggested this weekend that the Democratic Party must cut off its head to stand a chance in 2012. Schoen was back on America Live ...

Great <b>news</b>: Dems ready to push amnesty during lame duck session <b>...</b>

Great news: Dems ready to push amnesty during lame duck session.

eric seiger

eric seiger

Google <b>News</b> Blog: Credit where credit is due

News publishers and readers both benefit when journalists get proper credit for their work. That can be difficult, with news spreading so quickly and many websites syndicating articles to others. That's why we're experimenting with two ...

Obama 2012 - Doug Schoen - Fox <b>News</b> | Mediaite

Fox News' Democratic analysts have thrown President Obama under the bus: Doug Schoen and Pat Caddell suggested this weekend that the Democratic Party must cut off its head to stand a chance in 2012. Schoen was back on America Live ...

Great <b>news</b>: Dems ready to push amnesty during lame duck session <b>...</b>

Great news: Dems ready to push amnesty during lame duck session.

eric seiger

Google <b>News</b> Blog: Credit where credit is due

News publishers and readers both benefit when journalists get proper credit for their work. That can be difficult, with news spreading so quickly and many websites syndicating articles to others. That's why we're experimenting with two ...

Obama 2012 - Doug Schoen - Fox <b>News</b> | Mediaite

Fox News' Democratic analysts have thrown President Obama under the bus: Doug Schoen and Pat Caddell suggested this weekend that the Democratic Party must cut off its head to stand a chance in 2012. Schoen was back on America Live ...

Great <b>news</b>: Dems ready to push amnesty during lame duck session <b>...</b>

Great news: Dems ready to push amnesty during lame duck session.

eric seiger

Google <b>News</b> Blog: Credit where credit is due

News publishers and readers both benefit when journalists get proper credit for their work. That can be difficult, with news spreading so quickly and many websites syndicating articles to others. That's why we're experimenting with two ...

Obama 2012 - Doug Schoen - Fox <b>News</b> | Mediaite

Fox News' Democratic analysts have thrown President Obama under the bus: Doug Schoen and Pat Caddell suggested this weekend that the Democratic Party must cut off its head to stand a chance in 2012. Schoen was back on America Live ...

Great <b>news</b>: Dems ready to push amnesty during lame duck session <b>...</b>

Great news: Dems ready to push amnesty during lame duck session.

eric seiger eric seiger
eric seiger

eric seiger
eric seiger

Google <b>News</b> Blog: Credit where credit is due

News publishers and readers both benefit when journalists get proper credit for their work. That can be difficult, with news spreading so quickly and many websites syndicating articles to others. That's why we're experimenting with two ...

Obama 2012 - Doug Schoen - Fox <b>News</b> | Mediaite

Fox News' Democratic analysts have thrown President Obama under the bus: Doug Schoen and Pat Caddell suggested this weekend that the Democratic Party must cut off its head to stand a chance in 2012. Schoen was back on America Live ...

Great <b>news</b>: Dems ready to push amnesty during lame duck session <b>...</b>

Great news: Dems ready to push amnesty during lame duck session.

eric seiger

Google <b>News</b> Blog: Credit where credit is due

News publishers and readers both benefit when journalists get proper credit for their work. That can be difficult, with news spreading so quickly and many websites syndicating articles to others. That's why we're experimenting with two ...

Obama 2012 - Doug Schoen - Fox <b>News</b> | Mediaite

Fox News' Democratic analysts have thrown President Obama under the bus: Doug Schoen and Pat Caddell suggested this weekend that the Democratic Party must cut off its head to stand a chance in 2012. Schoen was back on America Live ...

Great <b>news</b>: Dems ready to push amnesty during lame duck session <b>...</b>

Great news: Dems ready to push amnesty during lame duck session.

eric seiger

Google <b>News</b> Blog: Credit where credit is due

News publishers and readers both benefit when journalists get proper credit for their work. That can be difficult, with news spreading so quickly and many websites syndicating articles to others. That's why we're experimenting with two ...

Obama 2012 - Doug Schoen - Fox <b>News</b> | Mediaite

Fox News' Democratic analysts have thrown President Obama under the bus: Doug Schoen and Pat Caddell suggested this weekend that the Democratic Party must cut off its head to stand a chance in 2012. Schoen was back on America Live ...

Great <b>news</b>: Dems ready to push amnesty during lame duck session <b>...</b>

Great news: Dems ready to push amnesty during lame duck session.

eric seiger