Focusing on the Negatives, rather than on the Positives

Doctors Struggle to Treat Gram-Negative Bacterial Infections - NYTimes.com: "To be sure, MRSA remains the single most common source of hospital infections. And it is especially feared because it can also infect people outside the hospital. There have been serious, even deadly, infections of otherwise healthy athletes and school children.

By comparison, the drug-resistant Gram-negative germs for the most part threaten only hospitalized patients whose immune systems are weak. The germs can survive for a long time on surfaces in the hospital and enter the body through wounds, catheters and ventilators.

What is most worrisome about the Gram-negatives is not their frequency but their drug resistance.

“For Gram-positives we need better drugs; for Gram-negatives we need any drugs,” said Dr. Brad Spellberg, an infectious-disease specialist at Harbor-U.C.L.A. Medical Center in Torrance, Calif., and the author of “Rising Plague,” a book about drug-resistant pathogens. Dr. Spellberg is a consultant to some antibiotics companies and has co-founded two companies working on other anti-infective approaches. Dr. Rice of Cleveland has also been a consultant to some pharmaceutical companies."

"Cash"ing it in....

Johnny Cash song iTunes' 10 billionth download | Crave - CNET: "Louie Sulcer of Woodstock, Ga., just won Apple's iTunes Countdown to 10 Billion Songs contest with the purchase of Johnny Cash's 'Guess Things Happen That Way.' This also means the song is the 10 billionth song downloaded from Apple's Store using iTunes.
With his purchase, Salcer got the best deal ever for an online music purchase, a gift certificate for music worth $10,000."

The Tomatoes of Strategic Sourcing and Ethics

A few weeks ago I gave a lecture on Strategic Sourcing and concluded it by explaining the potential for highly unethical acts within Sourcing.

Hence it does not come as a big surprise to read about bribery in the food business. Rotten all the way around. One more reason to know and thank the hands that feed us.

SK Foods at Center of Bribe Scheme to Sell Tainted Tomatoes - NYTimes.com: "Over the last 14 months, Mr. Watson and three other purchasing managers, at Frito-Lay, Safeway and B&G Foods, have pleaded guilty to taking bribes. Five people connected to one of the nation’s largest tomato processors, SK Foods, have also admitted taking part in the scheme."

H-1B Visa Program - What's the intent?

There seems to be a lot of misrepresentation about the intent of the 'non-immigrant' H1-B visas. They were expected to be used only for hiring, for a short duration, foreigners with specific skill sets when there was no domestic worker available with those skill sets. Over time this has been "enhanced" to a point where the purpose of the visas is unclear. Is an H-1B visa a temporary stop on the way to giving a foreign worker an immigrant visa? If so, why go through this charade?

H-1B Visa Program Again Under Fire - Government IT from eWeek: "A new study by the Economic Policy Institute claims some companies are using the H-1B visa program to transfer work overseas and to take advantage of cheaper guest worker labor.

Despite claims to the contrary, many tech firms are using H-1B visas to fill temporary positions and not as a pathway to permanent citizenship, according to a new study by the Economic Policy Institute."

Excuse Me, Is This Seat Taken? - NYTimes.com

Excuse Me, Is This Seat Taken? - NYTimes.com: "Some airlines have responded by tweaking their policies to encourage large passengers to buy more space. On Feb. 1 Air France, which for the last five years has offered “passengers with a high body mass” the option of buying a second seat in economy at a 25 percent discount, said it would reimburse the cost of the second seat if the plane wasn’t full. Last year, United set a formal policy to get large passengers to buy an upgrade or extra seat after it received 700 complaints in 2008 from customers whose seatmates did not fit into a single seat. Since then, said Robin Urbanski, a United spokeswoman, that number has dropped to about 100."

Not Healthy to Trust Anti-trust

In a must-read NYT piece Mr. Robert Reich points out the anti-trust protection that the health insurance industry enjoys.

Interesting note from Health Care for America Now...Executives and shareholders of the fivebiggest for-profit health insurers, UnitedHealthGroup Inc., WellPoint Inc., Aetna Inc., HumanaInc., and Cigna Corp., enjoyed combined profitof $12.2 billion in 2009, up 56 percent from theprevious year. It was the best year ever for Big Insurance.

Op-Ed Contributor - Bust the Health Care Trusts - NYTimes.com: "Astonishingly, the health insurance industry is exempt from federal antitrust laws, which is why a handful of insurers have become so dominant in their markets that their customers simply have nowhere else to go. But that protection could soon end: President Obama on Tuesday announced his support of a House bill that would repeal health insurers’ antitrust exemption, and Speaker Nancy Pelosi signaled that she would put it toward an immediate vote...

With size has come not only market power but political clout. Big for-profit insurers deploy enough campaign money and lobbyists to get their way with state legislators and insurance commissioners. A proposal last year to allow California’s Department of Insurance to regulate rates, for example, died in committee. These companies have even been known to press states to limit how many other health insurers they license.

And when they can’t get their way, insurers go to court. In Maine — one state that aggressively regulates rates — WellPoint’s Anthem subsidiary has sued the insurance superintendent for reducing its requested rate increase.

Political clout can be especially advantageous at the federal level, as the big Wall Street banks have so brazenly demonstrated. Over the past two and a half years, WellPoint’s employees and associates have contributed more than $922,000 to federal political campaigns, and the company has spent $7.8 million lobbying Washington policymakers, according to the Center for Responsive Politics. It should not be surprising that WellPoint was one of the leading opponents of the public insurance option, which would have subjected it to competition even where it had sewn up the market..."

Banking on FDIC

List of Troubled Banks at 16-Year Peak, F.D.I.C. Says - NYTimes.com: "After weathering the nation’s worst run of bank failures in nearly two decades, the Federal Insurance Deposit Corporation announced Tuesday that it had added 450 institutions to its list of challenged lenders in 2009 and warned that the industry was likely to remain under stress.

The number of so-called problem banks rose to 702 at the end of 2009, compared to 252 at the beginning of the year. Both the number of troubled institutions and their total assets are at the highest level since 1993, putting enormous strain on the government-administered insurance fund that protects customer deposits."

Nap, Nap...As I was saying an hour ago...

BBC News - Nap 'boosts' brain learning power: "A nap during the day improves the brain's ability to absorb new information, US scientists claim.
Volunteers who slept for 90 minutes during the day did better at cognitive tests than those who were kept awake.
Results of the University of California at Berkeley study involving 39 healthy adults were presented at a conference...."

This Counseling neither Washes nor Flies...

More excesses by execs...

Morningstar’s Footnoted.org finds unflattering, unusual business perks - chicagotribune.com: "In May 2009, as companies like Sara Lee began to eliminate executive cars and private use of corporate jets, Motorola co-Chief Executives Gregory Brown and Sanjay Jha were required to use corporate jets for personal travel "in connection with our overall security program," which resulted in a combined "incremental cost" of $558,306 on the planes alone in 2008. But at some point between 2004 and 2009, Motorola downsized (but also updated) its fleet of six Cessna Citation IIIs and a Gulfstream IV with three Gulfstreams, including one that can go around the world with one stop, and a Dassault Falcon 50EX.

•In 2008, Deere & Co. began disclosing that its executives were receiving company-provided car washes, at an unreported cost. More recent filings show that's still the case. But beginning in fiscal 2010, executives have to reimburse the company for security services, such as drive-by checks and alarm responses at their homes.

•In fiscal 2007, Deere Chairman Robert Lane received $324,825 worth of personal use of the corporate jet, a threefold increase from the year before. His use rose again in 2008 to $401,732. But in 2009, it dropped to $91,509. Why? The company stopped including maintenance costs in its calculations due to "minimal personal usage of company aircraft."

These perks also can go two ways. When former FedEx Executive Vice President Kenneth Masterson retired five years ago, the company gave him an unusual gift: a John Deere tractor.

Footnoted has also highlighted the growing trend of companies paying for "financial counseling" for its executives. Normally, this perk amounts to a few thousand dollars. But at Kraft, Executive Vice President Sanjay Khosla received a $51,679 "financial counseling allowance" in 2007. His allowance fell to a more standard $7,500 in 2008. The company also apparently spent $12,443 maintaining Chief Financial Officer Timothy McLevish's former home in New Jerseyin 2008, in "accordance with Kraft's relocation policy" for employees "above a certain level."

Kraft did not return calls for comment; the other companies confirmed details or otherwise acknowledged the filings..."

Oh...not Hare, anymore.

Chicago's ORD, one of the world's busiest airports, is going through big changes to small planes.

American to outsource at O'Hare - chicagotribune.com: "American Airlines plans for the first time to outsource flights at O'Hare International Airport as it bolsters its summer schedule, the Tribune has learned.

The move is angering pilots of the airline and its American Eagle subsidiary, and is part of a broader reshaping of O'Hare operations that is causing passenger traffic and revenue to sharply decline.

Operating under the American Connection brand and subcontracted to regional carrier Chautauqua Airlines, the new flights will carry American customers to 15 cities scattered between Oklahoma City and Cincinnati.

American Eagle pilots have filed a grievance challenging the move, which they contend isn't allowed under their contract. But American disagrees and is pushing ahead."

Flatness....meets Fatnes

Small stories keep popping up....about a local township doing something desperate because it is in dire financial straits. Mr. Friedman, of the 'World is Flat' fame highlights a story about Tracy, CA, where citizens might have to pay, separately, for 911 services.

This blogger has been writing for a while about the exce

sses over the past few decades, and spending beyond one's means. I don't know why Tracy, or Friedman, is not using the usual argument- the debt is a small % of GDP, so let's borrow more.

Op-Ed Columnist - The Fat Lady Has Sung - NYTimes.com: A small news item from Tracy, Calif., caught my eye last week. Local station CBS 13 reported: “Tracy residents will now have to pay every time they call 911 for a medical emergency. But there are a couple of options. Residents can pay a $48 voluntary fee for the year, which allows them to call 911 as many times as necessary. Or there’s the option of not signing up for the annual fee. Instead they will be charged $300 if they make a call for help.”Welcome to the lean years.Yes, sir, we’ve just had our 70 fat years in America, thanks to the Greatest Generation and the bounty of freedom and prosperity they built for us. And in these past 70 years, leadership — whether of the country, a university, a company, a state, a charity, or a township — has largely been about giving things away, building things from scratch, lowering taxes or making grants.But now it feels as if we are entering a new era, “where the great task of government and of leadership is going to be about taking things away from people,” said the Johns Hopkins University foreign policy expert Michael Mandelbaum.Indeed, to lead now is to trim, to fire or to downsize services, programs or personnel. We’ve gone from the age of government handouts to the age of citizen givebacks, from the age of companions fly free to the age of paying for each bag.

Mr. Alito doesn't do CBS...

From MSNBC: Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito didn't like hearing President Barack Obama publicly criticize the high court's ruling removing corporate campaign spending limits — and he didn't try to hide it.Alito made a dismissive face, shook his head repeatedly and appeared to mouth the words "not true" or possibly "simply not true" when Obama assailed the decision Wednesday night in his State of the Union address.The president had taken the unusual step of publicly scolding the high court, with some of its members in robes seated before him in the House. "With all due deference to the separation of powers," he said, the court last week "reversed a century of law that I believe will open the floodgates for special interests — including foreign corporations — to spend without limit in our elections." *************

Turns out that Mr. Alito does not read the papers or follow the news. Today CBS reported its earnings and commented on its expectations for this year...The Ruling, according to CBS Q&A, can bring in $500 Million more into the mid-term election fights.

On the Call: CBS CEO Leslie Moonves - Yahoo! Finance: "CBS Corp. is predicting a banner year for political ad spending, thanks in part to the Democrats losing their super-majority in the Senate, and a Supreme Court ruling last month that lets corporations buy ads for candidates.

When asked about how much the midterm elections would benefit CBS, Chief Executive Leslie Moonves said on the company's fourth-quarter conference call Thursday that the Supreme Court ruling itself could bring $500 million extra spending into ad markets."CBS Corp. is predicting a banner year for political ad spending, thanks in part to the Democrats losing their super-majority in the Senate, and a Supreme Court ruling last month that lets corporations buy ads for candidates.When asked about how much the midterm elections would benefit CBS, Chief Executive Leslie Moonves said on the company's fourth-quarter conference call Thursday that the Supreme Court ruling itself could bring $500 million extra spending into ad markets.

QUESTION: We were showing that in the last midterm election your stations did about $160 million (in political ad revenue), and that is what we were using until the Supreme Court decision. Could you provide any granularity around what the last presidential cycle was, because it feels to us like that is going to be the better comparison given the new rules at the Supreme Court?

RESPONSE: "The last presidential cycle was somewhat down from that, from the off cycle.

There are a lot of things that we feel are giving us wind at our back regarding that. Number one, as you have seen, there are a lot more political contests than one would have expected even three or four months ago, also because of what happened in Massachusetts. There are a lot more races that we think are going to be rather hotly contested and that there is going to be a lot of money behind them. Then you add to that the Supreme Court ruling, which some say could bring in another $500 million to the political marketplace, and once again we don't know what that is, but generally speaking, we have gotten approximately 10 percent of what is out there. So it is difficult to project, but to put us around the $200 million mark would not be that far out, I don't believe."

Just one of the loopholes...

Obama is ruffling a few feathers in India by his comments on U.S. firms investing overseas. However, he has a good point. Quite a few multinationals game the system and pay taxes far below the 35% corporate rate. But the tax issue is only a minor one. There are several other loopholes that need to be investigated.

The Hindu : Business News : U.S. wants Indian firms to create jobs in America: "Mr. Obama had said earlier this week, “If you are a business here, entirely located in the US, and investing in the U.S., and hiring workers in the U.S., you are paying a 35 per cent rate”.

“However, if you are a multinational and you are investing in India, and your workforce is in India, and your plants and equipment are in India, but your headquarters are here, you are taking deductions on all the expenses in India, but you are keeping your profits outside the U.S.; and that just doesn’t seem entirely fair”, he had argued."

Do No Evil - Does Good by Wikipedia

Wikipedia is a very useful source of information on a variety of topics. It is very handy for travelers - in providing information on public transportation in a variety of cities. Glad to see Google providing some funding to keep this great social effort going.

The Associated Press: Google donates $2 million to support Wikipedia: "Google Inc., the Internet's most profitable company, is giving $2 million to support Wikipedia, a volunteer-driven reference tool that has emerged as one of the Web's most-read sites."

Not your mom's "Generic Drugs" - Big Pharma sells fear

Brands Like GlaxoSmithKline Begin to Sell Generic Drugs - NYTimes.com: "Giants like Sanofi-Aventis and GlaxoSmithKline are not looking to enter the commodity generics market in the United States, where chain pharmacies often determine which generics they offer based on the lowest available price — and where consumers often view generic makers as interchangeable.

Instead, the big drug makers are pursuing a growing consumer base in emerging markets like Eastern Europe, Asia and Latin America where many people pay out of pocket for their medicines but often cannot afford expensive brand-name drugs.

And, in some emerging markets, where the fear of counterfeit drugs or low-quality medicines runs high, consumers who can afford it are willing to pay a premium for generics from well-known makers, industry analysts said. These products are known as company-branded generics, or branded generics. They carry the name of a trusted local or foreign drug maker stamped on the package, seen as a sign of authenticity and quality control."

Time to "de-friend" my students on Facebook...

Let's "Face" it....a Text"Book" case - Teachers cannot escape from criticism...

Student Suspended for Facebook Page Can Sue - NYTimes.com: "A South Florida teenager who sued her former principal after she was suspended for creating a Facebook page criticizing a teacher can proceed with her lawsuit, a federal judge has ruled.

The student, Katherine Evans, is seeking to have her suspension expunged from her disciplinary record. School officials suspended her for three days, saying she had been “cyberbullying” the teacher, Sarah Phelps. Ms. Evans is also seeking a “nominal fee” for what she argues was a violation of her First Amendment rights, her lawyers said, and payment of her legal fees.

The former principal, Peter Bayer, who worked at the Pembroke Pines Charter High School, had asked that the case be dismissed. But Magistrate Judge Barry L. Garber denied Mr. Bayer’s petition and rejected his claims of qualified immunity."

Nursing needed badly...for Nurseries

Nurseries struggle with lagging economy - Yahoo! Finance: "Florida, which produces 80 percent of the house plants grown in the United States, had about $844 million in sales of nursery stock in 2007 -- the last year figures were available. California, the second-largest producer, reported $1.6 billion in nursery stock sales in 2007.

Both states did not have more recent figures, but officials said they had seen a decline in business. They expect the industry to slowly recover -- but they also expect the belt-tightening will remain, with fewer purchases, less expansion and fewer employees."

Rights versus Entitlement

Apparently Silent Bob was bumped from a seat when he got on a Southwest flight as a stand-by.

'Silent Bob's' barrage squeezes airlines on obesity - Chicago Breaking Business: "Director Kevin Smith's Twitter-fit during the weekend highlights one uncomfortable reality of U.S. airline flying: airlines have less leeway to accommodate obese passengers at a time when Americans are getting fatter."

Lights Out...let the fun begin, Colorado Springs Way

Colorado Springs is providing a good case study for the rest of the country on how to deal with the budget crises.

Voters Refuse To Pay Bill; City Shuts Off Lights : NPR: "As a cost-saving measure, Colorado Springs is turning off streetlights. Flipping the switch on about 1/3 of the city's 24,512 streetlights is expected to save $1.245 million in electricity. But that's just a down payment on a $28 million budget gap for 2010.

Perhaps the most noticeable change for Colorado Springs' 400,000 residents will be in parks, where budgets have been slashed by nearly 75 percent.

'We've taken all the trash cans out. We're not going to be doing any litter collections in the parks,' says Larry Small, vice mayor for Colorado Springs. 'We're hoping the citizens will pack it out themselves.'

All the restrooms have been closed. There'll be very little watering, and crews will mow just once a month instead of weekly.

The city even trimmed its police and fire budgets and is auctioning three of its police helicopters on the Internet. Still, that's not enough.

'We did have a transit system,' Small says, 'That's gone almost completely now.'

The city sold nine buses and will use the proceeds to pay operating costs this year. On Jan. 1, 2010, busses stopped running on evenings and weekends."

Service Providers Ap(p)ing their Way...will the money jingle follow?

The big fight continues...between the service providers, the device makers, and the content owners.

BBC News - Mobile firms unite to offer applications: "Twenty-four of the largest phone operators have banded together to challenge the dominance of mobile app stores, such as that operated by Apple.
The Wholesale Applications Community, as it is known, aims to make it easier for developers to build and sell apps 'irrespective of device or technology'.
The alliance, which includes Vodafone, China Mobile and Sprint, has access to more than three billion customers.
Analysts said it was an attempt by operators to 'regain control of apps'.
However, research firm CCS Insight warned that operators 'have a poor track record with this type of industry consortium'."

*****

How will the service providers compete with each other when each one has a sizable global footprint?

Wall Street in Greece's bed

The crookedness of Wall Street seems to curve around mountains, fly over oceans and climb into Greece's bed. I'm glad to have a job where I can contribute positively to society, and don't have to work on the Street.

Wall St. Helped Greece to Mask Debt Fueling Europe’s Crisis - NYTimes.com: "Wall Street tactics akin to the ones that fostered subprime mortgages in America have worsened the financial crisis shaking Greece and undermining the euro by enabling European governments to hide their mounting debts.

As worries over Greece rattle world markets, records and interviews show that with Wall Street’s help, the nation engaged in a decade-long effort to skirt European debt limits. One deal created by Goldman Sachs helped obscure billions in debt from the budget overseers in Brussels.

Even as the crisis was nearing the flashpoint, banks were searching for ways to help Greece forestall the day of reckoning. In early November — three months before Athens became the epicenter of global financial anxiety — a team from Goldman Sachs arrived in the ancient city with a very modern proposition for a government struggling to pay its bills, according to two people who were briefed on the meeting.

The bankers, led by Goldman’s president, Gary D. Cohn, held out a financing instrument that would have pushed debt from Greece’s health care system far into the future, much as when strapped homeowners take out second mortgages to pay off their credit cards."

It's tough being a woman - mosquito, that is.

Engineers are always hard at work zapping stuff...now it is the turn of the female mosquito to zap the zapless engineers.

Using Lasers to Zap Mosquitoes - Bits Blog - NYTimes.com: "Using Lasers to Zap Mosquitoes"

Using Lasers to Zap Mosquitoes

By JENNIFER 8. LEE

TED / James Duncan David At the annual TED conference in Long Beach, Calif., Nathan Myhrvold presented a laser, built using common consumer electronic parts, that shoots down mosquitoes.

Can consumer electronics be used to combat malaria?

Nathan Myhrvold, Microsoft’s former chief technology officer, thinks so. His company, Intellectual Ventures, has assembled commonly available technology — parts used in printers, digital cameras and projectors — to make rapid lasers to shoot down mosquitoes in mid-flight. If bed nets are the low-tech solution to combat the deadly disease — caused by a parasite transmitted when certain mosquitoes bite people — the laser is a high-tech one.

He gave the first public demonstration of the laser, which was cobbled together from parts found on eBay, at the annual TED conferencein Long Beach, Calif., which features lectures and demonstrations by experts in a wide range of fields, including technology, politics and entertainment.

After hundreds of mosquitoes (which were kept in the hotel bathroom until showtime) were released into a glass tank, a laser tracked their movements and slowly shot them down, leaving their carcasses scattered on the bottom of the tank. While the demonstration was slowed down for public viewing, Mr. Myhrvold said that normally the lasers could shoot down anywhere between 50 to 100 mosquitoes per second.

Mr. Myhrvold played a slow-motion recorded video that showed what happened to a representative mosquito. As the insect flew, a sudden light beam struck it, disintegrating parts of its body into a plume of smoke. It fell, even as its wings continued to beat.

Mr. Myhrvold said the software detects the speed and size of the image before deciding whether to shoot. It would reject a butterfly or a human, for example, and more powerful laser blasts could be used for locusts. In regions afflicted by malaria, the lasers could be used to create protective fences around clinics, homes, or even agricultural fields as a substitute for pesticides.

The idea was born from a 2008 brainstorming session held on strategies for killing malaria-bearing mosquitoes, a particular interest of Mr. Myhrvold’s friend and former boss, Bill Gates, who has made the illness one of priorities of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation (to the point that Mr. Gates released mosquitoes into the audience at last year’s conference).

The idea of lasers — a miniature “Star Wars” weapons system — was thrown into the mix. “Everyone was like, ‘C’mon, be serious,’” Mr. Myhrvold said in an interview after the demonstration. After doing a little bit of research, he said, his team concluded that “this is feasible. We can actually do it. So we did.”

The breakthrough relied on understanding how the technology that guides the precision of laser printing could be combined with the image-detecting charge-coupled devices, or C.C.D.’s, used in digital cameras and powerful image processing software. Mr. Myhrvold said he thinks there is particular potential in the Blu-ray laser technology, because blue lasers are more powerful than red ones and there are a lot of them being made cheaply now.

He estimates that the devices could potentially cost as little $50, depending on the volume of demand. However, his company would not manufacture them. Rather, it built the technology mostly as a proof of concept. (Among other things, his company is also working on cooking technology.) Other companies would have to take the laser technologies to market, so the timeline for seeing the lasers in common use is uncertain.

The laser detection is so precise that it can specify the species, and even the gender, of the mosquito being targeted. “The women are bigger. They beat at a lower frequencies,” Mr. Myhrvold said. Since it is only the female mosquitoes who bite humans, for the sake of efficiency, his system would leave the males alone.

Treating EMS

EMS - Elusive Male Shopper

In Search Of The Elusive Male Shopper : NPR: "Men may never be the browsers women are. But Underhill says retailers — including supermarkets — could do more to capitalize on men's particular shopping habits.

'A remarkable number of men shop in the grocery at night because they simply don't like the crowd,' Underhill says. 'And those are the times in which maybe you should have a beer tasting going on in-store.'

Some stores are already working the alcohol angle. Mike Gatti, the executive director of the Retail Advertising and Marketing Association, says several specialty clothing stores have thrown successful beer and pizza events to lure men in and keep them there.

What's On Tap

Then there's the jewelry chain that's meeting customers where they're already at ease: bars.

'Bringing some of the jewelry into local bars so the men can see the jewelry in a place where they're kind of hanging out with their friends, they might decide to buy a piece of jewelry for their girlfriend in this bar,' Gatti says. 'Also creates a bit of peer pressure: 'Hey, you need to buy that for her.' '

He says efforts like these will catch on. Meanwhile, a new kind of in-store help is on the horizon: touch-screen shelf signs. Shoppers will have pages of computerized product information at their fingertips. Men should love it. They won't need to ask any questions at all."

Getting one's alpha, beta, and Omega - Sara Lee Style

Recently we had used Michael Pollan's book "In Defense of Food" in one of our classes. Mr. Pollan confronts the field of nutritional science and the products its generates.

Today Sara Lee came out with an announcement that should sandwich all Omega-3ers.

Sara Lee to launch Omega-3 bread - Chicago Breaking Business: "Downers Grove-based Sara Lee Corp. plans to launch a new bread made with Omega-3, which the company says is the first nationally distributed bread of its kind.

Omega 3 are a group of essential fatty acids found in certain plant foods, oils and fish. They have been linked to good heart and brain health.
Sara Lee will introduce Omega 3 through its Soft & Smooth line of breads, which are aimed providing more nutrition than white bread, but with a white bread texture. Soft & Smooth contains 30 percent whole grains."

Getting Cut, Gillette Style

5 is enough, but Gillette upgrades razor, again - Yahoo! Finance: "P&G Researcher Stew Taub said some 30,000 men were involved in testing and developing the latest Fusion over several years, with researchers studying groups of 80 subjects a day, recording how many strokes they used, which directions they shaved and other details.

'Shaving is a very complicated and precise operation,' he said.

The ProGlide will cost 10 percent more than the current Fusion, at a suggested price of $10.99 for a handle and a single shaving head.

The launch includes four new products to use before and after shaving, including a thermal scrub Taub says will mimic the effect of a barber's hot towel. They'll sell for $6.99 to $8.99."

Valentine's Day Farming on Facebook

Farmville seems to be the Buzz of the Day...

Farmville Users Send 500M Valentines in 48 Hours - NYTimes.com: "All Facebook reported early Wednesday that Farmville users, who plant crops and raise animals on their virtual plots of land, had sent 220 million virtual gifts to each other in 18 hours (Valentine gifts are free, although other things within Farmville can cost money). A check with a press spokesman from Zynga found that in the 48 hours since the launch at 6 a.m. PT Monday morning, more than 475 million had been sent. “We sent about 255 million yesterday and about 220 million the day before, for a total of about 475 million,” Lisa Chan said in an email. “Let’s just round up and call it a half billion :-).”"

Facility-ating Experiments

Facilities Layout is a fascinating topic. Experiments tying layout to innovation, productivity and other parameters continue to go on.

Square Feet - In Moving to New Home, Grey Traded the Cloistered Look for an Open Plan - NYTimes.com: "In November, after 45 years in cloistered offices at 777 Third Avenue, the advertising giant Grey Group moved to an open-plan layout in the International Toy Center building at 200 Fifth Avenue. The change was astonishing — and a little unsettling — for the 1,200 employees, who now occupy just six floors instead of 26. Before, most everyone had an office; now there are three in the entire company. And the floor that houses the creative and production departments lacks even cubicle walls."

Airlines to charge for inhaling and exhaling

American Airlines to charge $8 for blankets - Yahoo! Finance: "If you want a pillow and blanket in coach on American Airlines, it's going to cost you.

The airline will charge $8 for a pillow and blanket in coach class for domestic trips and some international flights longer than two hours, beginning May 1. The international flights are to and from Canada, Mexico, Hawaii, the Caribbean and Central America."

Bt Brinjal....Butted Out, for Now.

There has been a lot of discussion regarding the approval of Bt Brinjal, the genetically modified Brinjal, for cultivation.

BBC News - India puts on hold first GM food crop on safety grounds: "India has deferred the commercial cultivation of what would have been its first genetically modified (GM) vegetable crop due to safety concerns...."

India approved GM Cotton in 2002. Based on reports, either this crop has contaminated the organic cotton that India exports to other countries, or unscrupulous elements are mixing the cheaper GM version with organic variety and selling the whole package as organic.

What a Web of Fight We Kindle...

The Fight over Prices on the Internet - NYTimes.com: "The missing prices are part of a larger battle sweeping the world of e-commerce. Wary of the Internet’s tendency to relentlessly drive down prices, major brands and manufacturers — and now, book publishers — are striking back, deploying a variety of tactics and tools to control how their products are presented and priced online.

“You are seeing firms of all types test the waters” with strategies to control online pricing, said Christopher Sprigman, associate professor of intellectual property at the University of Virginia School of Law and a former antitrust lawyer at the Justice Department. “They feel they have more freedom to do it now.”

In many cases that freedom stems from a 2007 Supreme Court ruling in the case of Leegin Creative Leather Products v. PSKS. The ruling gave manufacturers considerably more leeway to dictate retail prices, once considered a violation of antitrust law, and it set a high legal hurdle for retailers to prove that this is bad for consumers.

Ever since that decision, retailers say manufacturers have become increasingly aggressive with one tool in particular: forbidding retailers from advertising their products for anything less than a certain price....

Just like other product makers, book publishers have also been emboldened by the Leegin decision. In their case, they want to prevent low prices on electronic books from cannibalizing their more profitable hardcover sales.

Instead of selling e-books wholesale to retailers like Amazon.com, the publishers want to sell them directly, setting prices and having the retailer act as an agent, taking a fixed 30 percent commission. Macmillan recently struck such an agreement with Amazon.com after a protracted dispute that led Amazon to remove, briefly, Macmillan’s electronic and physical books from its site. Deals with the other major publishers will most likely follow.

Book publishers “are using a different set of levers, and a different vocabulary, to get what they want,” said Scot Wingo, chief executive of ChannelAdvisor, which helps companies sell online. “But it’s the same outcome. Manufacturers are effectively controlling the price that the consumer sees on the Web.”"

Money for nothing...and Recovery for Free...

Get your money for nothing, get your chicks for free
Money for nothing, chicks for free
Look at that, look at that
Get your money for nothing, get your chicks for free (I want my, I want my, I want my M.T.V.)
Money for nothing and chicks for free
Easy, easy

That ain't working

..................Dire Straits, Money for Nothing, from Brothers in Arms

The Bankers are apparently unhappy with President Obama's plans for Wall Street and his rhetoric. So they are happily ignoring the enormous assistance the government has provided to them, and are air-freighting money to the Republicans who want to knock off all taxes.

And the expectation is that the "recovery" is around the corner...in Wodehousian language, 'Tchah!'

In a Message to Democrats, Wall St. Sends Cash to G.O.P. - NYTimes.com: "Just two years after Mr. Obama helped his party pull in record Wall Street contributions — $89 million from the securities and investment business, according to the nonpartisan Center for Responsive Politics — some of his biggest supporters, like Mr. Dimon, have become the industry’s chief lobbyists against his regulatory agenda.

Republicans are rushing to capitalize on what they call Wall Street’s “buyer’s remorse” with the Democrats. And industry executives and lobbyists are warning Democrats that if Mr. Obama keeps attacking Wall Street “fat cats,” they may fight back by withholding their cash."

Wasted resources

More data points keep coming in.

Frustrated job seekers deciding to call it quits - Yahoo! Finance: "Many jobless people have reached a conclusion that captures the depth of the unemployment crisis: Looking for a job is a waste of time.

The economy is growing. Yet it's creating few jobs. That's why in the past eight months, 1.8 million people without jobs left the labor market. Many had grown so frustrated by their failure to find a job that they threw up their hands and quit looking for one."

Not Glad...

Walmart Food-Bag Consolidation Leaves Out Glad, Hefty - Advertising Age - News: "he move follows a shootout in a series of store tests starting late last year, which appear to have prompted the Glad, Hefty and Ziploc brands to hike ad spending dramatically, despite a deep recession and flat to falling category sales, in efforts to stave off de-listings. The contests had high stakes for the brands, given that Walmart makes up a third or more of their sales. Walgreens and CVS, too, have significantly pared their trash and food bag brand lineups in recent months."

In Fulfilled Company

Is it the responsibility of a company to provide fulfillment to its employees? Should corporate careers provide rewards in addition to financial benefits?

Bloomberg.com: "As demonstrated by the young women in Dubai, this rewards remix is percolating around the globe and permeating even traditional cultures. The women in Dubai were looking for their careers to open doors to personal fulfillment — and had no qualms about jumping ship if their company isn't prepared to help.

What does this mean for the Middle East's economic dynamo? With birth rates plummeting faster than almost anywhere else in the world, a war for talent is heating up in this region. Employers may well need to step up to the plate and take smart women's demands much more seriously."

Job(loss)-full of errors

Job losses from Great Recession about to get worse - Yahoo! Finance: "Job losses during the Great Recession have been huge and they're about to get bigger.

When the Labor Department releases the January unemployment report Friday, it will also update its estimate of jobs lost in the year that ended in March 2009. The number is expected to rise by roughly 800,000, raising the number of jobs shed during the recession to around 8 million."

****

That's a revision of around 11% of the original numbers. The market gets fixated on the weekly numbers.

A not-twit data point

The young prefer Facebook to blogging, Twitter - USATODAY.com: "Teens are eating up Facebook but are not so keen on Twitter, and they are not blogging as much as they used to, according to the Pew Internet Project's report.

Lenhart says blogging among teens and young adults has plummeted to half what it was in 2006. In that year, 28% of teens ages 12-17 and adults ages 18-29 were bloggers. By the fall of 2009, the numbers had dropped to 14% of teens and 15% of young adults. During the same period, the percentage of online adults over 30 who were bloggers rose from 7% in 2006 to 11% in 2009.

"What we think is really going on here — why young people aren't doing blogs anymore — is that there's been a move fromMySpace, which put blogging front and center, to Facebook, which doesn't have that," Lenhart says.

The report also indicates that wireless connectivity is high among adults under 30, and social networking continues to climb.

But Twitter hasn't gained much ground with teens — only 8% of 12- to 17-year-olds who go online say they ever use it. That's unusual, because teenagers have a history of being early adopters of nearly every online activity, Lenhart says.

Lenhart says researchers asked some teens in focus groups about their Twitter perceptions.

"Most had no idea what it was," Lenhart says. "Some knew it as 'that thing Lance Armstrong and other celebrities do.' "

She says there may be a perception with Twitter that you have to "feed the beast," and that may keep them away, Lenhart says.

Selling...a (fictitious) Narrative

The Murdoch/Ailes Fox Network provides a good case study in Strategy...

Clearly it has "outsold" its competitors in "selling" a narrative.

But whether the public should be sold a "narrative" of "news" is a question that Fox does not ask.

Stewart tells O'Reilly he's voice of sanity on Fox - Yahoo! Finance: "Fox 'is the most passionate and sells the clearest narrative of all the news networks, if ... you're still referring to it in that manner,' Stewart said.

O'Reilly pointed out that Fox is like a newspaper with news and opinion pages, an idea Stewart poked fun at.

'Fox in and of itself doesn't say you're a news network all day,' he said. 'What is it, you're news from 9 to 11, then you're opinion, then you're news again from 1 to 2:30 except for the Jewish holidays? And then on alternate parking days you're news, but Christmas, you're not?'"

Walking away....from Values

As Values Slide, More Weigh Walking Away From Mortgages - NYTimes.com: "...The number of Americans who owed more than their homes were worth was virtually nil when the real estate collapse began in mid-2006, but by the third quarter of 2009, an estimated 4.5 million homeowners had reached the critical threshold, with their home’s value dropping below 75 percent of the mortgage balance. They are stretched, aggrieved and restless. With figures released last week showing that the real estate market was stalling again, their numbers are now projected to climb to a peak of 5.1 million by June — about 10 percent of all Americans with mortgages..."

This article describes mortgage holders who have either walked away or are considering walking away from their mortgages. A few points are worth considering.

1. Perhaps no one with a mortgage should be called a homeowner if the bank "owns" the house. Quite a few comments on the NYT article suggested that the mortgage holders (MH) should walk away because the bank took the risk and the house belongs to the bank. However, the technicality is that the house is purchased by the owner, and the bank only has a lien on it. So the mortgage holder takes the risk for the value of the property- the bank takes a risk on the ability of the mortgage holder to pay the amount. Hence ethical values suggest that a mortgage holder, if capable of paying the monthly amount of the mortgage, should pay irrespective of the value of the house. That is the contract the mortgage holder agreed to.
2. Any effort by the government to fund a bail-out of the MH that is piled on the tax payers creates Moral Hazards. More importantly, it saddles everyone with the burden of paying for the mistakes of the MH and the banks. Since the banks made lots of money selling and trading these mortgages, why not force the management of the banks to write down all these loans to the current value of the properties? When the shareholders take a bath perhaps the management of the banks would start cleaning their brains.

A Federally Rewarding Game....If only one can play it

***********The Treasury borrows money by issuing bonds. The Fed sets interest rates low and makes it really inexpensive for the Treasury to borrow. Furthermore, the Fed buys up government debt if others are not willing to or if the buyers demand higher rates. The Fed instructs the printing presses to print more money, which the banks can borrow at almost zero cost and then buy treasuries and make money at no risk. The Fed reports interest income..."The Fed said much of its income, $46.1 billion, came from its open-market buying of U.S. Treasury debt, debt of mortgage finance sources Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, and mortgage bonds and other securities. The program was aimed at holding down interest rates to spark an economic recovery..."

*******What a game!**********

News Analysis - A Decade of Enormous Deficits May Alter American Politics and Power - NYTimes.com: "

In a federal budget filled with mind-boggling statistics, two numbers stand out as particularly stunning, for the way they may change American politics and American power.The first is the projected deficit in the coming year, nearly 11 percent of the country’s entire economic output...But the second number, buried deeper in the budget’s projections, is the one that really commands attention: By President Obama’s own optimistic projections, American deficits will not return to what are widely considered sustainable levels over the next 10 years. In fact, in 2019 and 2020 — years after Mr. Obama has left the political scene, even if he serves two terms — they start rising again sharply, to more than 5 percent of gross domestic product. His budget draws a picture of a nation that like many American homeowners simply cannot get above water... One source of that absence of will is that the political warnings are contradicted by the market signals. The Treasury has borrowed money to finance the government’s deficits at remarkably low rates, the strongest indicator that the markets believe they will be paid back on time and in full..."

Borrowing 41 cents while raising 59...and spending it all

Another big budget and big deficit from the White House...

In these times, perhaps all elected officials should walk the deficit reduction talk by taking a sizable pay cut. Practice before preaching- is not something that is practiced in Washington.

Obama unveils $3.83T budget with massive deficits - Yahoo! Finance: "President Barack Obama sent Congress a $3.83 trillion budget on Monday that would pour more money into the fight against high unemployment, boost taxes on the wealthy and freeze spending for a wide swath of government programs.

The deficit for this year would surge to a record-breaking $1.56 trillion, topping last year's then unprecedented $1.41 trillion gap. The deficit would remain above $1 trillion in 2011 although the president proposed to institute a three-year budget freeze on a variety of programs outside of the military and homeland security as well as increasing taxes on energy producers and families making more than $250,000."

Global Experience

For the better part of the last century students in the USA did not have to worry about global issues. They could graduate and find good employment within the US of A. Now, the game has been altered dramatically. Students are finding that international experiences add value to their resumes. Thanks to this attribute more young people are learning about other countries. This can only lead to a more informed citizenry, more responsive government, and hopefully a more peaceful world.

***

Interns chase international experience, hope it pays off with a job - chicagotribune.com: "Employers are looking to hire people who understand the economies and cultures of the world, he added.

'We just hear CEO after CEO saying that the work force of the future, really, the work force of the present, has to be a cross-culturally competent work force. Work forces are cross-cultural; businesses are global,' he said."

Creating jobs...courtesy the Supreme Court

President Obama wants to spend more money, via deficit financing, on job creation. Why not embrace the recent Supreme Court decision and let corporations spend their largess on candidates and political ads, as long as that spending creates jobs? Perhaps elections can be held on a monthly basis so that the corresponding corporate spending can be smoothed. The Supreme Court can then be given credit for job creation without deficit financing.

Obama pairs a push for jobs with proposed spending cuts - chicagotribune.com: "President Obama wants Congress to quickly approve a jobs bill in the range of $100 billion, a top White House official said Sunday, reflecting the growing political anxiety among Democrats about stubbornly high unemployment in an election year.

The push for jobs-creation legislation, on top of the $787-billion stimulus measure that Obama signed into law one year ago, comes as Republicans have accused the party in power of pursuing a costly and ineffective economic recovery strategy."