The purpose of this blog is to provide interesting information about current events, business, economic issues and holiday decorating. From time to time we will redistribute content we feel will be of interest to our readers. Copyright laws are followed and sources are always listed. Feel free to read some of the posts if they interest you and let us know what you think about them if you like. Thanks for stopping by.
Disney Vacation Club Brand New Money Saver Package Plans to Open in New York
February 27, 2009Disney’s Doorway to Dreams, to be located at Roosevelt Field on Long Island, is planned to feature full-scale, two-bedroom vacation home model, interactive zones, children’s play area and more
(February 9, 2009) Scheduled to open later this summer, Disney’s Doorway to Dreams will offer Roosevelt Field visitors and Long Island, N.Y.-area residents a convenient and exciting way to learn firsthand about Disney Vacation Club, an innovative vacation-ownership program that helps families enjoy flexibility and savings on decades of future vacations.
Disney’s Doorway to Dreams will showcase the accommodations at Disney Vacation Club resort hotels, which are spacious and offer numerous home-like amenities. These vacation villas provide families with a place to relax and spend quality time together either at Disney destinations worldwide or at more than 500 other popular vacation locations around the world. This convenient mall location will give them a glimpse of the choices they have, from a magical stay at the Walt Disney World Resort or a relaxing cruise aboard a Disney Cruise Line ship to a family-friendly, interactive Adventures by Disney trip or an exotic jaunt to South America.
“Our first Disney’s Doorway to Dreams location has been very popular and a great way for Chicago-area residents and visitors to learn more about the family vacation experiences available through Disney Vacation Club,” said Disney Vacation Club President Jim Lewis. “Now, we are delighted to bring Disney’s Doorway to Dreams to New York, which is one the top markets for our rapidly growing membership base, so that more people can discover all that Disney Vacation Club has to offer.”
To help families envision just what those vacations will entail, Disney’s Doorway to Dreams, located at Roosevelt Field on Long Island, NY, will feature a full-scale, two-bedroom model of the vacation home accommodations Disney Vacation Club members and their families can expect to find at Disney Vacation Club resort hotels.
“Disney has always been a unique and innovative leader in the timeshare industry,” said Howard C. Nusbaum, chief executive officer of the American Resort Development Association (ARDA). “Now, Disney’s Doorway to Dreams allows New York-area families the chance to experience how a timeshare ownership can help ensure years and years of memorable family vacations.”
Designed to create a fun and immersive experience, Disney’s Doorway to Dreams is planned to go beyond featuring model accommodations to offer an interactive family vacation discovery zone, comfortable discussion areas and a supervised children’s play area within its approximately 6,900 square feet of retail space.
Celebrating more than 50 years of offering more choices, Roosevelt Field is located at the intersection of Old Country Road and the Meadowbrook Parkway in Garden City and is managed by Simon Property Group, Inc., headquartered in Indianapolis, Indiana. The mall offers unparalleled customer service with amenities including Simon Giftcards, good everywhere Visa debit cards are accepted and Simon American Express Giftcards, which can be used everywhere American Express cards are welcomed; Ticketmaster at Simon Guest Services, valet parking; complimentary wheelchairs; strollers and a post office. It is anchored by Nordstrom, Macy’s, JC Penney, Bloomingdale’s and Dick’s Sporting Goods and has more than 270 specialty stores.
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Drug Company Forest Laboratories Offered Doctors Cash to Write Prescriptions
February 27, 2009-
Pushes the drugs for unapproved use on children
Drugmaker Forest Laboratories Inc. offered kickbacks to doctors for prescribing its antidepressants Celexa and Lexapro and pushed the drugs for unapproved use on children, according to a complaint filed Wednesday by federal prosecutors.
The New York-based drugmaker offered cash payments, expensive meals and entertainment to induce doctors and others to prescribe the drugs, the complaint said. It also accused Forest of promoting Celexa for pediatric use, even though a study showed it was no more effective than a placebo for children.
The allegations were contained in a suit the Department of Justice filed in federal court alleging Forest triggered thousands of fraudulent claims to federal health care programs like Medicaid.
Forest executive Frank Murdolo said he hasn’t seen the complaint and could not comment on it. But he said it stemmed from a federal government investigation into his company’s marketing practices that dates back to 2004.
The vice president of investor relations said Forest has disclosed this investigation in filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission.
“It’s the formalization of that investigation, basically, but it’s not new as far as a disclosure issue to the company,” he said.
The complaint also said the Celexa study found that more patients taking the drug attempted suicide or reported suicidal thoughts than those taking the placebo. The Food and Drug Administration denied Forest’s request to sell the drug for children, but that failed to dissuade the drugmaker.
“Over the course of more than half a decade, Forest illegally marketed two related antidepressant drugs, Celexa and Lexapro, for off-label use in pediatric patients when both drugs had been approved only for adult use,” the complaint states.
Pharmaceutical companies are prohibited from promoting drugs for uses not approved by the Food and Drug Administration.
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Funeral Home Let Dead Corpse Rot Because Family Skipped Bill
February 27, 2009A funeral director accused of leaving a woman’s body to decay in a parked hearse after her relatives failed to pay the bill was arrested on a felony charge of abusing a corpse, police said Wednesday.
Watson and Sons Funeral Home in Alabama embalmed the remains of Edna Kathleen Woods, 52, after she died of natural causes in November 2007, said Gadsden police Sgt. Jeff Wright. Relatives wanted the body cremated but failed to sign the necessary paperwork or pay owner Harold Watson Sr., he said.
After storing the corpse at his funeral home for more than a year, Wright said, the 76-year-old Watson decided to move it because he couldn’t reach the woman’s family.
Someone complained about a foul smell near downtown Gadsden, about 60 miles northeast of Birmingham, and officers on Tuesday found the woman’s remains in a cardboard box that was inside a locked hearse parked on a piece of property that Watson owns.
Watson was arrested after officers tracked the hearse to him. The body apparently was in the hearse for about two months, and the battery had been removed so no one could move the vehicle, Wright said.
Funeral directors with unclaimed bodies can file a petition to have counties dispose of remains.
“He knows better. The family wouldn’t pay him, so he just got rid of it,” Wright said.
Watson was free on bond and did not immediately return a message left at his funeral home. It was not immediately known if he had an attorney.
The head of the state office that regulates Alabama’s funeral industry said Watson could lose his director’s license if convicted.
“We don’t have many cases this bizarre,” said Warren Higgins, executive secretary of the Alabama Board of Funeral Service. “We’re just waiting to hear more from the authorities in Gadsden.”
Police didn’t know how much the woman’s relatives owed, and it wasn’t clear who notified officers about the hearse.
Higgins said the funeral agency had not received any complaints about Watson’s work since the early 1980s, when questions arose about whether he could use the name “Watson and Sons” for the business because his sons were not licensed morticians.
Watson was allowed to continue using the name provided he hired a licensed embalmer, Higgins said. Watson is not licensed to embalm bodies.
Jail Guard Smuggles Drugs In For Prisoners Stashed Inside Tacos
February 27, 2009-
Syringes, Pot, etc…..
A former jail guard in Arkansas has been sentenced to 28 years in prison for sneaking syringes, marijuana and cell phones to inmates by hiding the items in food.
Deputies say 26-year-old Jordan Michael Waller carried tacos, pizzas and chili to work at the Miller County jail.
He used the food to hide a stash of cell phones and chargers, methamphetamine, marijuana, tobacco and cigarette rolling papers
Family members testified Waller had paranoid schizophrenia that manageable with medication. Jail officials denied knowing of Waller’s illness. He was sentenced Thursday in Texarkana.
The long-troubled jail had 13 escapes last year. A number of guards were fired, and some faced criminal charges for improper conduct with inmates.
Straight Teeth: Scientists Discover Secret to Avoiding Crooked Teeth
February 27, 2009-
No Braces – Scientists Discover Secret To Straight Teeth
Ever wonder why sharks get several rows of teeth and people only get one? Some geneticists did, and their discovery could spur work to help adults one day grow new teeth when their own wear out.
A single gene appears to be in charge, preventing additional tooth formation in species destined for a limited set. When the scientists bred mice that lacked that gene, the rodents developed extra teeth next to their first molars — backups like sharks and other non-mammals grow, University of Rochester scientists reported Thursday.
If wondering about shark teeth seems rather wonky, consider: Tooth loss from gum disease is a major problem, here and abroad, and dentures or dental implants are far from perfect treatments. If scientists knew exactly what triggers a new tooth to grow in the first place, it’s possible they could switch that early-in-life process on again during adulthood to regenerate teeth.
“It’s exciting. We’ve got a clue what to do,” said Dr. Songtao Shi of the University of Southern California School of Dentistry, who said the Rochester discovery will help his own research into how to grow a new tooth from scratch.
Also intriguing: All the mice born without this gene, called Osr2, had cleft palates severe enough to kill. So better understanding of this gene might play a role in efforts to prevent that birth defect, the Rochester team reported in the journal Science.
Teeth may not be visible until long after birth, but they start to form early in embryo development. Teeth ultimately erupt from a thickened band of tissue along the jaw line called the dental lamina, a band that forms in a top layer of the gum called the epithelium. Scientists have long thought the signals for tooth formation must lie in that tissue layer as well.
Not so, the Rochester team found: All the action takes place instead in a deeper cell layer called the mesenchyme.
Think of the Osr2 gene as a control switch, a kind of gene that turns on and off the downstream actions of other genes and proteins. In that mesenchymal tissue, the Osr2 gene works in concert with two other genes to make sure budding teeth form in the right spot, said lead researcher Dr. Rulang Jiang, a geneticist at Rochester’s Center for Oral Biology.
“It’s almost a self-generating propagation of the signal” that leads to one tooth after another forming all in a row, he explained.
Knocking that molecular pathway out of whack causes either missing or extra teeth to result, Jiang showed in a series of mouse experiments.
Wal-Mart Employee Burned Alive – Suicide
February 27, 2009Wal-Mart Employee Burns Himself to Death
He ‘Couldn’t Take it Anymore’ – Disgruntled Employee Commits Suicide By Buring Himself Alive
A disgruntled 58-year-old Wal-Mart employee lit himself on fire in a strip-mall parking lot Thursday night, saying only that he “couldn’t take it anymore,” ChicagoBreakingNews.com reported.
The man, who wasn’t identified, died later at the hospital.
The employee, who worked the overnight shift, doused himself in lighter fluid around 10 p.m. outside the Chicago-area discount store before setting himself on fire, according to ChicagoBreakingNews.com.
At least 10 people witnessed the act and several attempted to rescue the man by throwing their jackets on him in an effort to put out the flames — but he refused assistance.
“He said he didn’t want any help and threw the coats off,” said Randy Sater, a watch commander with the Bloomingdale fire department.
When questioned by a police officer at the scene as to why he was committing suicide, the man, who was by that time severely burned, said, “I just couldn’t take it anymore,” ChicagoBreakingNews.com reported.
A store manager said he didn’t know why the employee took his life and said he hadn’t recently been laid off.
The victim was rushed to a local hospital before being transferred to the burn unit at Loyola University Medical Center in Chicago.
He was pronounced dead there at 12:42 a.m.
Click here to read more on this story from ChicagoBreakingNews.com.
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Student Gives Birth in Shower Puts Baby in Plastic Bag
February 27, 2009Student Gives Birth in Shower Puts Baby in Plastic Bag
University of Arizona sophomore was arrested and charged with attempted first-degree murder and child abuse, Wednesday, after she gave birth to an infant in a communal university shower hall and then placed the child in a plastic bag, the Arizona Daily Wildcat reported.
Sarah Tatum, 19, who allegedly hid her pregnancy from the other students in her dorm, telling them that she had been gaining weight due to a thyroid problem, was discovered by two of her hallmates in the shower hall, Monday, with a bag of what they thought were bloody clothes, according to the Daily Wildcat.
When the pair looked more closely at the bag, however, they realized that it was moving and that Tatum had placed her child inside.
“The plastic bag was the kind with the draw string on top,” said Jaime Perez, a family studies and human development freshman, who lives in Arizona-Sonora and is a close friend of one of the hallmates who found Tatum. “She tied the bag so tight that the policeman had to cut it with a knife.”
Tatum, who is from Scottsdale, was trasported from the dorm to a hospital before she was arraigned Wednesday, the Daily Wildcat reported. She was later released from jail into the custody of Pretrial Services under strict condition to surrender her passport, agree not to leave Pima County, have no contact with the child and to seek a mental medical examination.
The baby is still alive and is being cared for at a local hospital.
Click here to read more on this story from the Arizona Daily Wildcat.
This story was filed by UWIRE, which offers reporting from more than 800 colleges and universities worldwide. Read more at www.UWire.com
Source:
http://www.foxnews.com/printer_friendly_story/0,3566,502106,00.html
Obama Declares War on Entrepreneurs, Investors And Business
February 27, 2009-
He Is Sharing Your Wealth With People You Don’t Even Know
Let me be very clear on the economics of President Obama’s State of the Union speech and his budget.
He is declaring war on investors, entrepreneurs, small businesses, large corporations, and private-equity and venture-capital funds.
That is the meaning of his anti-growth tax-hike proposals, which make absolutely no sense at all — either for this recession or from the standpoint of expanding our economy’s long-run potential to grow.
Raising the marginal tax rate on successful earners, capital, dividends, and all the private funds is a function of Obama’s left-wing social vision, and a repudiation of his economic-recovery statements. Ditto for his sweeping government-planning-and-spending program, which will wind up raising federal outlays as a share of GDP to at least 30 percent, if not more, over the next 10 years.
This is nearly double the government-spending low-point reached during the late 1990s by the Gingrich Congress and the Clinton administration. While not quite as high as spending levels in Western Europe, we regrettably will be gaining on this statist-planning approach.
Study after study over the past several decades has shown how countries that spend more produce less, while nations that tax less produce more. Obama is doing it wrong on both counts.
And as far as middle-class tax cuts are concerned, Obama’s cap-and-trade program will be a huge across-the-board tax increase on blue-collar workers, including unionized workers. Industrial production is plunging, but new carbon taxes will prevent production from ever recovering. While the country wants more fuel and power, cap-and-trade will deliver less.
The tax hikes will generate lower growth and fewer revenues. Yes, the economy will recover. But Obama’s rosy scenario of 4 percent recovery growth in the out years of his budget is not likely to occur. The combination of easy money from the Fed and below-potential economic growth is a prescription for stagflation. That’s one of the messages of the falling stock market.
Essentially, the Obama economic policies represent a major Democratic party relapse into Great Society social spending and taxing. It is a return to the LBJ/Nixon era, and a move away from the Reagan/Clinton period. House Republicans, fortunately, are 90 days sober, as they are putting up a valiant fight to stop the big-government onslaught and move the GOP back to first principles.
Noteworthy up here on Wall Street, a great many Obama supporters — especially hedge-fund types who voted for “change” — are becoming disillusioned with the performances of Obama and Treasury man Geithner.
There is a growing sense of buyer’s remorse.
Well then, do conservatives dare say: We told you so?
Source:
http://www.cnbc.com/id/29434104/
Posted By: Larry Kudlow | Anchor
Obama Bailing Out US Banks
February 27, 2009-
Obama Bailing Out US Banks
The Obama administration is trying to walk a public relations tightrope in aiding the banking industry.
On one side is an angry electorate that wants to see a wounded financial services industry embarrassed and penalized. On the other is a group of powerful institutions whose survival and revival are critical to the success of the President’s costly and controversial economic stimulus plan.
“The public reaction to the executive compensation issues that have received so much attention was more vociferous than the Obama administration would have expected,” says Robert Schwartz, a partner at the law firm of Smith, Gambrell & Russell, which represents big and small banks in the Southeast.
“Therefore, they’re sort of walking on a thin-ice issue about how much disclosure they’re willing to make about the amount of assistance that is needed in the financial sector and the amount of assistance that the government is trying to provide,” he added
Those conflicting agendas are evident in the Treasury’s financial stability plan, making it difficult, if not impossible, say analysts, to please both sides and effectively deal with the problem.
“You come up with the most acceptable [plan] but maybe not the most effective one,” says Scott Valentin, a banking analyst at Friedman, Ramsey & Billings and a former examiner at the Office of Thrift Supervision.
The problem dates back to the time almost a month ago when the administration decided to release a plan.
“I’m at a little bit of a loss at what was the rush for (Treasury Secretary Timothy) Geithner to roll this out,” says economist Dean Baker, co-director of the Center for Economic & Policy Research. “In general, I think they’re kind of torn.”
And that’s led to dogging concerns that the administration has a hidden agenda for nationalization, which officials have had to repeatedly deny.
“I don’t think they’re rooting for the banks,” says veteran money manager, Jim Away, managing director at Zephyr Capital, reflecting a common Wall Street perception. “They’re rooting for a transition in the banking structure, where there is much more government control.”
“It’s incrementalism … creeping nationalization,” says Valentin.
Though that remains to be seen, skepticism remains high even as the administration reveals more details about key components.
First Stress, Then the Rest …
That’s been the case thus far for two of the big new ideas: the stress test and somewhat related Capital Access Program, or CAP.
From the moment it was introduced, most analysts considered the stress test—meant to gauge how the banks capital conditions can weather further economic decline over the next couple years—a PR imitation of what already existed. Critics also doubted there would be sufficient transparency about key metrics being used.
“There’s no way for them to really know who needs what and who doesn’t need what,” says Robert Brusca, chief economist at Fact & Opinion Economics. “The part of the balance sheet that is troubled can’t be evaluated,” he said, referring to the problem of pricing so-called bad assets.
Even the disclosure of more details this week failed to quiet skeptics.
“My concern is that it is not going to be a serious stress test,” says Baker, adding that the government’s worst-case scenarios for key economic barometers, such as the unemployment rate, are too optimistic. “No one could quibble with them for being negative–if you said 11 percent.”
Instead, the government threshold doesn’t even top 10 percent, which the jobless rate did for almost a year during the recession in 1982.
Put a CAP on It
The stress test results will determine what firms are eligible for financial aid under the CAP program and that’s created more questions.
With the Bush administration’s version of that concept widely criticized by Democrats in Congress for being too lenient on and generous to Wall Street firms, the Obama administration made significant changes and additions, including restrictions on executive compensation.
Among other things, the government will now get a 9 percent dividend in return for its investment rather than the Bush administration’s 5 percent and the equity stake automatically converts from preferred to common stock at a certain point, diluting shareholder equity.
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“These are not favorable terms; they are not draconian, but they are difficult and expensive terms,” says one well-placed industry source. “I doubt this will get a lot of pick up.”
Analysts say though no one is disputing the government’s right to get a good return on its investment and to protect taxpayer interests, the terms may defeat the purpose of providing critical capital to needy banks.
“You’re looking to strike the right balance,” says Brusca. “In giving out free money, one of the first things you try to do is not look bad, that firms just don’t take the money because it’s a pretty good deal.”
“The terms have now gotten tougher,” says former FDIC Chairman William Isaac, who doesn’t expect banks to participate “unless they really need it.”
So even though the government maintains that the tests are not pass/fail or meant to determine winners and losers, a class structure could emerge.
“Capital is so unavailable elsewhere aren’t they going to have to,” says Schwartz, who among others dismisses the government’s notion that there’s a realistic capital alternative to the CAP.
Now What?
The administration will soon face another key confidence test when it reveals details of its private-public partnership fund to purchase toxic assets, which has also received a lukewarm reception.
BAILOUT, BANKING, OBAMA ADMINISTRATION, STRESS TESTS, CAP
Many consider that the heart of the problem–and solution–especially when it comes to stimulating lending, already depressed by the conventional forces of recession.
“The stimulus plan can not work unless we first have in place a strong financial system, and that means people having confidence that these big banks won’t fail or be nationalized,” says Ken Thomas, a banking industry consultant, who lectures at the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School of Finance “When they go after the big banks and attack them they’re just hurting the whole system.”
That may be, but the president may have to work harder to make that clear to anxious taxpayers, who could lose their job any day, much like he tried to do in a nationally televised speech to Congress Tuesday night.
”If you want to save the system you have to save the banks,” says Eric Dezenhall, who runs a Washington-based crisis management consultancy. ”That is not an intuitive message.”
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