MLM Directory

Where can i get case study information consisting of 3 Legal firms (sm, med, & lg national) and 1 Medical? case studies about marketing to law firms...???

WHEN SHOULD I APPLY TO LAW FIRMS AS A PARALEGAL? I would like to gain some experience before I apply to law school. I want to apply to BIGLAW firms as a legal assistant. I live in a big city (NY/NJ legal market) Can I apply anytime and if so, when can I expect to start working? Specifically, if I graduate in May, when do I apply? And if I graduate in February, (if i finished these classes) when do I apply? Thanks!!

How to start a Legal Process Outsourcing Company in India for doing works of US, UK and EU Law Firms ? I have good law office with all modern facilities in India and have a very good team of lawyers with me.We are into legal consultancy, documentation, drafting etc. for the last 10 + years. We can undertake outsourcing jobs in a timebound manner to the statisfaction of the client. We want to be into the emerging LPO market in India and seek advice as to how to start with.

Best Legal Law Firm Recruiter in Chicago? I am looking at re-entering the job market after several years of raising children. Can anyone recommend a Chicago-area law firm placement service for a support staff position???

who is the target market for a law firm? who is the target market for a law firm? im really struggling since they don`t sell products.Btw the law firm offers traditional legal services such as family law,commercial and corporate law etc.also they offer commercial and private client services.

Do we really have the 'best legal recruitment market in years'? Why do people say that, for law firms, we have the best legal recruitment market in years? Is it because people are being laid off therefore there are skilled people out there ready to recruit? I'd be interested to hear from someone with knowledge of the profession who can explain this to me, thanks.

i am looking at a degree in law (llb) though am unsure about the future legal job market for solicitors? when i come out of uni with a llb and after my LPC, which is a five year stint part time as weel what will the legal job market look like and will i find it hard to find a job. i hear that the legal side is saturated with too many law graduates but not enough firms nor jobs. please help with the answering of this question.

Is it illegal for a law firm to charge clients for a volunteers time? Due to the job market, I may volunteer at a law firm to keep my resume fresh and in hopes that I prove my worth to the firm and they hire me. If I do this, is it legal for the law firm to bill clients for my time while not paying me?

law firms call after accident - where did they get my number? I have law firms or fake firms call after i had an auto accident - where did they get my cellphone number? The accident happened in Philadelphia PA district. They all claim they looked at the police report and got my info - the police report doesn't contain my phone number. I also want to know if there is a new law passed that allows for this type of marketing of legal cervices - it's outrageous that someone is calling me to solicit legal compensation for an accident, no wonder we pay so much for auto insurance. I keep getting calls and now like 5 letters in the mail! I checked and only my name is on the police report... This must be made illegal... When I got into an accident outside Philly, I didn't get harassed like this.

Typical job interview questions for a legal secretary position? I have a second phone interview on Monday with a Law firm, for the position of junior legal secretary, and I need to prepare myself for what they might ask. In my first phone interview they asked me why I wanted to work in a law firm when I just studied a diploma in marketing. They asked me my strengths and weaknesses as well. What a some other questions they may ask me? Or what's some good questions I could ask? Oh and I'm 17, and have a management diploma in marketing/media and a diploma in office administration.

Law student looking for employment. Legal job market is awful. Feeling pretty gloomy about the future.Advice? I am a third year law student graduating in May. My grades are not so great but my experience is. Here is the question for any lawyers or law students out there: is now a good time to send out resumes to firms? I feel like they will just throw them in the trash. Any advice? Why the hell did I go to law school?

How do I start A Para-Legal business? I graduated in 2007, I would like to do some production of documents for law firms, I would also like to place Para-Legals' with potential clients how can I go about marketing my ideas?

Should I work for accounting firm or law firm? I am graduating a 2nd tier law school near NYC area. I was lucky enough to secure a job before at one of the Big 4 accounting firms in NYC starting this fall. The problem with this job is that (1) it is not a law firm, so I won't be practicing law technically, and (2) I'm not too crazy about tax law (or accounting). But it's a very reputable firm and pay and benefit is good. I've gotten mixed reviews from people about how I must start with a law firm to get experience, and it will be hard for me to branch out once I focus on tax law right after school. My concern is that my grades are not the highest (I have 3.0GPA) and I'm not at a first tier law school. I know the job market is pretty bad and I'm not sure if I can get a job that will pay comprable to what I'll get paid from the accounting firm. What should I do? Is the legal job market in NYC really that bad? I wouldn't mind working for a smaller firm, as long as I can get paid enough to cover my loans and expenses.

Is it legal in US to call people to solicit donations without prior consent? Is it legal to get phone numbers off the internet or from a marketing firm and call people in the US to solicit donations for a non-profit organization registered in the US? If there are any US laws that prohibit such activities, could you please provide some detail about them?

Looking for a marketing/sales/promotional/positioning consultant experienced in the Outsourcing business.? We are looking for a marketing/sales consultant with excellent communication skills and a well-developed network of contacts in law-related domains. We will need this person to contact prospective clients in the US and Europe, promote our services and help bring projects our way. Ours is a legal process outsourcing firm based in India. We have an excellent team with an array of stellar qualifications in the related field. Our clients are small-and mid-sized law firms as well as corporations who want to get attractive prices for their legal services needs.Please have a look at our website for further details. website - http://www.indogeniclpo.com Where can I find a consultant experienced in the outsourcing buyer's market in the USA?

What should i study to make my career path interesting? I am a lawyer by profession with 4 yrs exp with a law firm. Now for past 2 yrs, I am working in a large Indian company handling (marketing & bit of legal) Estate Planning for HNIs...pretty good at my job but now I think that i wouldn't get a job in any other company considering I have mixed-up the legal with marketing. Therefore I am looking out for a further education to broaden my horizon. Should I do MBA, LLM, CS, CFP??? Pls help!!!

What should i study to make my career path flourish? I am a lawyer by profession with 4 yrs exp with a law firm. Now for past 2 yrs, I am working in a large Indian company handling (marketing & bit of legal) Estate Planning for HNIs...pretty good at my job but now I think that i wouldn't get a job in any other company considering I have mixed-up the legal with marketing. Therefore I am looking out for a further education to broaden my horizon. Should I do MBA, LLM, CS, CFP??? Pls help!!!

For a typical U.S. state, what are the laws governing merging a legal estate practice with financial advising? I'm think of using a law degree to get into a small practice where I could advise clients on wills, trusts, and estates, but I would also like to be more involved on advising clients on market-based investing, becoming a CFA as well. I'm just wondering what are the state jurisdictions in the U.S. most favorable to this set up, and what the typical state laws are for people who want to start up a small firm merging both legal and financial advice.

is my experience level not good enough for at least volunteer at criminal law firm? i will give my resume tomorrow to a friend who will give it to his criminal law attorney, i'm 20 years old and the only experience i have is i co-own an affiliate marketing website (which is doing very well) and i'm a part of my college law society. is that a bad experience resume because i want to intern at this big firm. i also have a 3.7 GPA. will those 3 get me the position, or are they gonna say at my age i should already have worked in the legal field and i don't have enough experience? if my resume isn't good enough for intern i will at least work as volunteer, at least i just need some experience in a law department before i go to law school in a year. i don't want them not to accept me because i don't have any prior law firm experience.

I have established a legal billing outsource service, I'm looking for the most cost efficient way to market. Currently I am working full time as a Billing Specialist with a large NJ law firm, so the most marketing I'v done so far is sending out annoucements. I have a home office set up and ready to provide billing services to small law fims, 1-15 billing attorneys. As soon as I sign up at least 2 firms I will be able to resign from my current job and devote full time to my billing service. After 20 years of billing for lawyers I decided it was time for me to establish my own service and offer my expertise to up and coming lawyers at a very reasonable rate. Recently I was offered a small business loan that would allow me to leave my job and focus on marketing until I have established my clients. I refused the loan because I do not think it would be wise for me to get myself into that kind of debt. My home office set up: computers, printers, website, billing software etc... were at my expense. Please let me know what your thoughts are concerning my business/marketing issue.

Have you ever been put on probation at work (law firm) and if so, do you think it's okay to quit the job? I am a 6th year attorney in a large law firm and I just had my annual performance review. I was told by 3 partners that my billable hours (lawyers are suppose to bill at least 1800 hours a year) are way below what it should be for an attorney of my level (6th year) and they put me on probation. I am not sure for how long and what happens if I don't meet their billable goal thereafter, I'm guessing that I would be terminated. My question is, has anyone been in a similar situation and is quitting your job a good idea during this time. I have never been put on probation, have worked at this same firm for the past 6 years, I know the legal job market is tough right now. I would be losing all my vacation days to fulfill their minimum billable requirement and overall, I am just ashamed/embarassed that I am deficient as an attorney in my billing requirements. I feel deflated and most of all, ashamed that I am not good enough.

NYT Article on Law Schools: No Longer Attractive? This article in the New York Times should be a real eye-opener for any students thinking about attending Law School: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/09/busine… Some excepts: "A generation of J.D.’s face[s] the grimmest job market in decades. Since 2008, some 15,000 attorney and legal-staff jobs at large firms have vanished, according to a Northwestern Law study. Associates have been laid off, partners nudged out the door and recruitment programs have been scaled back or eliminated....more entry-level legal work is now outsourced to contract temporary employees, both in the United States and in countries like India. It’s common to hear lawyers fret about the sort of tectonic shift that crushed the domestic steel industry decades ago." ""Avoid this overpriced sewer pit as if your life depended on it,” writes the anonymous author of the blog Third Tier Reality — a reference to the second-to-bottom tier of the U.S. News rankings — in a typically scatological review. “Unless, of course, you think that you will be better off with $110k-$190k in NON-DISCHARGEABLE debt for a degree that qualifies you to wait tables at the Battery Park Bar and Lounge.” “This idea of exceptionalism — I don’t know if it’s a thing with millennials, or what,” she says, referring to the generation now in its 20s. “Even if you tell them the bottom has fallen out of the legal market, they’re all convinced that none of the bad stuff will happen to them. It’s a serious, life-altering decision, going to law school, and you’re dealing with a lot of naïve students who have never had jobs, never paid real bills.” "“Most of us either went to the wrong law school, which is the bottom two-thirds, or we were too old when we graduated,” he said. “I was 32 when I graduated, and at 32 you’re washed up in this field, in terms of a shot at the real deal. They perceived me as somebody they can’t indoctrinate into slave labor and work to death for seven years and then release if they don’t like you.” So why is it so many students still want to go to law school?

What are things that an employer looks for in a potential intern? My fiance just got a great job in the Washington DC area, so I'm now in the process of applying for internships around that area. I feel I'm fairly competitive, I have an undergrad degree in Communication Studies with a Data Analysis specialty and a minor in Spanish that I finished in 3 years and have completed one year of law school. My last two jobs were an intern at a law firm and an office manager for a computer company. I've applied for several internships so far, and plan on applying for more in the days to come. I'm applying for a broad range of internships from PR to legal work to human resources and marketing communications, to utilize both my undergraduate and graduate experience. But what do employers look for in a potential intern? Any tips for securing an internship? There seem to be plenty of opportunities in the area and I would love for one of them to be for me :) Actually, my fiance has offered to pay everything. But I'm an independent person and won't let him do it, so I plan on doing everything ON MY OWN. I'm looking to go to D.C because it's that or move back home for the summer to work there, and that would be miserable. Sheesh, how about you stop making judgments when you don't know the whole story? That would be great.

How to become a nurse paralegal? I have a paralegal degree and I'm currently working for a small law firm. We've been doing a lot of health care work and lately I've considered becoming a nurse paralegal...but I think I'm at a disadvantage? All of the nurse paralegal training programs and job openings I've researched are for RNs with years of clinical experience. It seems Iike I'd have to quit my paralegal job, go to nursing school, then work as a nurse for years before I'd qualify for any of these programs. I'm wondering about going to nursing school and then marketing myself as a paralegal with an RN degree, rather than a nurse with 6 months of paralegal training. I have no desire to work in a clinical setting for years, but I want the education to make informed medical decisions in a legal background. Whatcha think? PS--no hate mail please: my sister, brother-in-law, and two aunts are nurses. I have nothing against nurses, it just isn't my calling.

need help creating a profile for a law firm includes? law office profile also consist of number of attorneys and staff fuctions and resposibilitys a mission statement legal specialty areas targeted market of clients

A previous employer does not allow employees to give job recommendations for former employees. Is this legal? A former employer restricts current employees from giving job recommendations for former employees. I have a number listed as references as I worked at the firm for over 12 years. Is this restriction legal under Texas and Federal employment law? Doesn't this restriction violate my ability to market myself to prospective employers and what are my options short of a civil suit?

Why do politicians get away with stealing while America can see them do it? Discloses $2 million in business arrangements The Washington Times by Jim McElhatton Democratic vice-presidential candidate Sen. Joseph R. Biden Jr. has paid more than $2 million in campaign cash to his family members, their businesses and employers over the years, a practice that watchdogs criticize as rife with potential conflicts of interest. The money largely flowed from the coffers of Mr. Biden’s failed presidential campaign during the past two years to a company that employs his sister and longtime campaign manager, Valerie Biden Owens, according to campaign disclosure filings. The senator from Delaware also directed campaign legal work to a Washington lobbying and law firm founded by his son R. Hunter Biden, the disclosures show. Putting family members and their companies on the political payroll is legal if the work is legitimate and charged at market rates, according to the Federal Election Commission. Still, public watchdog groups have long criticized such arrangements. “Even though legal within restraints, it’s not something I view as completely ethical,” said Craig Holman, legislative director for Public Citizen, a campaign finance watchdog organization. “Any candidate ought to shy away from that.” Aides to Mr. Biden said all of the payments he has made to family members or their employers were aboveboard.

Privacy act and other legal issues? A is a company that is involved in the collection of marketing information (magazine subscriptions) and usually purchases them off other parties. The thing is, one of A's employee saw that a firm also included their consumer's credit card and personal details. The employee said that it shouldnt go into their database but this was rebutted by his boss, as he thinks only the database managers would have access. The question here is, under the Australian law, what are some of the legal issues faced and the dilemma the employee is facing? What could and should he do? Help please! Thanks

India law rules for registering a firm/society/ngo ? (no company suggestion plz)? Can any one help me or suggest me legal procedure to register a firm , society NGO i am merging different works can any one suggest me how i should register and follow on there are following queries i am starting a business i am not interested to form any company or private limited company. I want to do local business 1. Can i register 2-3 firm name at same address as per law and rules 2. I want to register 1 name and then its sister concerns for marketing eg.(quasar technologies, quasar education...etc.) or may be with diff name (like BSNL have dataone cellone ) type of names 3. How to patent or protect others to take my name and use of my name 4 What taxes and govt organization i have to register the firm in India 5. How much i get time from govt to register my firm for taxes . I am starting a new business with combination of :- 1. Cyber cafee 2. Gaming 3. Tours & travels 4. Placement consultancy 5. Matrimony consultancy 6.. Property consultancy 7. Education ( coaching Classes, tuition classes) 8 Hardware 9 Software development 10 web development 11 ALL It job works 12 Project works 13. Stationary, broadband mobile and other sale purchase 14 cd gallery and books library and lot more to add........

What career am I best suited for? I don't want work with nonprofits or as a paralegal anymore. What career am I best suited for with my current education and work experience? And, how do I pursue a career in the industry you recommend? I'm interested in government/politics, journalism, lobbying, higher education, research, advertising, and music. I'd like a job with growth potential in an large organization with good management infrastructure (no more small companies or operations). This is my truncated resume: Director of Programs—Chamber of Commerce Develop and coordinate programs to support and improve local business. Design and draft marketing materials to publicize Chamber programs using MS Publisher, Constant Contact, and Adobe Contribute. Foster partnerships with schools, government officials, businesses, and community organizations to attain the specified goals related to each program. Legal Coordinator—The Willett Law Firm, P.A. Developed an action plan with the NC State Bar to wind-down John G. McCormick’s law practice. Assisted clients with filing grievances with the NC State Bar and finding alternate legal counsel. Legal Assistant/Paralegal—John G. McCormick, P.A. Organized and managed the firm’s accounts payable and receivable using QuickBooks and Timeshlips software. Assisted personal representatives with estate planning and settlement. Performed title and lien searches and helped to prepare closing packages for real estate transactions. High School Social Studies Teacher Taught Economic, Legal & Political Systems, which is an overview of stock market investing and micro- and macroeconomics concepts, civics, law, and a comparative study of historical and modern political and economic systems in foreign countries. Y2K Readiness Project Administrator –Quintiles, Inc. Communicated with project managers to track compliance and contingency planning. Managed and tracked project data using MS Excel. Legal Assistant–Rucci, Burnham, Carta & Edelberg, L.L.P., Helped defense prepare for a criminal trial in Puerto Rico discovery for a client charged with violating Savings and Loans regulations. Employee Assistance Program Intern–United States Tobacco Co. Education: Juris Doctorate, Campbell University Norman A. Wiggins School of Law, Two years completed Summer Program, Handong International Law School, South Korea Master of Arts in Teaching, Univ. of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, NC Bachelor of Science in History, Appalachian State Univ., Boone, NC NC State Bar Certified Paralegal Relevant Coursework: History of the World Since 1945 Germany Since 1917 U.S. Foreign Policy U.S. Intellectual Tradition Constitutional Law Islamic History Asian History Latin American History Latin American Politics American and National Government Political Parties and PACs Law & Ethics of Communications Theory & Practice of Persuasion History of American Public Education Microeconomic Theory Race, Poverty & Politics Globalization Comparative Law & Culture (U.S. v. Asian Traditions) International Business Transactions Constitutional Law Entertainment Law Education Law Contracts Torts Civil & Criminal Procedure Criminal Law

Why did Biden Give Campaign Cash To Family Members? campaign funds to family members, their businesses and employers over the years, raising questions about potential conflicts of interest. The money came from Biden's failed presidential campaign during the past two years. The largest chunk, $1.8 million, was paid to a company that employs his sister and longtime campaign manager, Valerie Biden Owens, according to campaign disclosure filings viewed by The Washington Times. Biden also gave campaign legal work to a lobbying and law firm co-founded by his son R. Hunter Biden, the filings reveal. Paying family members and their companies is legal if the work is legitimate and charged at market rates, according to the Federal Election Commission. But public watchdog groups have been critical of such arrangements. "Even though legal within restraints, it's not something I view as completely ethical," Craig Holman, legislative director for the campaign finance watchdog group Public Citizen, told The Times. "Any candidate ought to shy away from that." Biden aides say all the payments he has made to family members or their employers were legitimate, and spokesman David Wade told The Times that no Biden family members are being paid by the Obama-Biden campaign. The $1.8 million paid to his sister’s firm, Joe Slade White & Co., was for media consulting, and much of the money went to produce and air political ads. Other Biden campaign and political action committee expenditures over the years included more than $50,000 in salary to his sister, and more than $150,000 to Hunter Biden’s Washington lobbying firm Oldaker, Biden & Belair. Wade asserted that none of the money went to Hunter. Hunter and Joe Biden’s brother James were accused in two lawsuits of defrauding a former business partner and an investor of millions of dollars in a hedge fund deal that went bad, The Washington Post reported in August. Hunter and James countered that the former partner defrauded them by misrepresenting his experience in the hedge fund industry and recommending that they hire a lawyer with felony convictions. Hunter Biden announced in September that he had quit working as a federal lobbyist, amid concerns that his work undermined Barack Obama’s anti-lobbyist rhetoric, the Times noted. Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington analyzed campaign filings covering the 2002, 2004 and 2006 election cycles, and its report listed Joe Biden among the top five senators in terms of salaries and fees paid to family members

I'd like to do a BVC or LPC through distance learning? I'm a law graduate who would like to work in a law firm in Abu Dhabi. I'm a new graduate, and I don't have a lot of experience praticing law (although I've been employed in other capacities (marketing and communications) for the past 7 years)... Can someone advise me on what would be the best way to enter the legal job market in Abu Dhabi? a) should I do a Bar Vocational Course or a Legal Practitioner's Course (for solicitors) to qualify for a job? b) If so, can I do these courses through distance learning, while based in Abu Dhabi? Is there any other way I can qualify to practice law?

Singed noncompete clause 2yrs ago w/former employer (wouldnt help recruit new firm). Newfirmneedspeople legal? Is it legal for a company to force an employee not to leave if a former employee helps a new firm recruit? I have gone onto Westlaw and found nothing specific enough to brove my understanding that this is illegal - a firm cannot restrict competion in the market (labor market in this situation). This is also in Texas, and 'right to work' state, or employment at will state. My new firm needs staff and I want to 'cover my bases' by finding laws or cases to help in the case that some people leave my old firm based on my giving the new firm their name and number.

Can soft copy of a document be used as concrete evidence as per Indian Law? Is it possible to use soft copies of documents as evidence? For example if someone creates a marketing document and is later threatened with legal action for the same even though the document was never circulated, is it something to worry about? To cite a specific example I have a friend who produced a document which was never circulated using his firms systems. Even though he is no longer at the firm he is being threatened with legal action from his firm. Is there any specific recourse for him? for clarification I meant a copy of a document prepared on MS Word/Power Point/ etc

Would Kyla Ebbert have any trouble getting into a top law school such as Harvard or Yale? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kyla_Ebbert A story was released today on AOL about Kyla Ebbert, a 23 year old student who was asked to "cover herself up" by Southwest Airlines who deemed her miniskirt offensive to other passengers, getting a gig on Playboy. She also did a promotional for Virgin Airlines with Richard Branson. Her career goal is to be an attorney. Regardless of her academic merit, is she someone that a top 10 law school would admit? Would someone like her be able to get into any top firm? I simply can't see her unemployed in the legal job market. There's nothing wrong with hiring her technically. It just shows that justice isn't quite as blind as it seems.

MBA vs. Law Degree, Help Deciding? Here's the dilemma. I work at a law office right now as a legal assistant/office manager. What this means is that I am in charge of not only writing legal documents, but also our marketing and business protocols. My boss, our attorney, always jokes about how much of a better CEO I would be than a future law partner, which I'm pretty much ensured were I to go to law school. I enjoy both aspects of my job equally, but I would agree that I am a slightly better business man. I guess what my question pertains to the kinds of jobs an MBA would provide you with, as well as the upward mobility it gives. Is the salary of a person with an MBA anywhere comparable to that of your typical entry level lawyer, which where I live, is about $70,000 for a regional firm? Thanks in advance for the information, I appreciate any and all help on the matter.

Which Class Should I Take In The Fall? Business Administration with a concentration in Sports Management Major? I'm registered for Spanish, Sports Marketing, Sports Management and Sports Law. Which other class should I take: SPMG 434 Sport and Society: This course examines the relationship between sport and society. Students will develop an understanding of how sports, professional and amateur, can influence social life. The course also addresses social issues from within the sports world, how they are perceived, and how fans respond to them. The various perceptions and social limits of sport across diverse cultures will also be studied. It will also examine the social and cultural history of sports and its influence on our social institutions, such as politics, the economy and government. Highlighted will be issues such as race, gender, deviance and social problems, and youth socialization in relationship with sports. ECON 210 Business Report Writing and Presentations: Contemporary business environments require excellence in managerial literacy to effectively communicate and promote business objectives and policies. This course undertakes the development of written and oral skills applicable to any professional position, utilizing the latest modes of communications technologies. ECON 220 Macro-Economics: A study of the modern mixed American economy, national income, employment, output, price levels, economic growth and fluctuations, monetary and fiscal policies, current events relating to the American economy. ECON 230 Ethics: The Corporate Community in Society: A discussion of general ethical concepts and issues in society and the role ethics plays in business. The course examines the ethical responsibilities of the business entity to local, national and global communities and their affect on business practices. Legal versus ethical issues of truthfulness, fair play, collaboration and competition are analyzed. Ethical codes of conduct applicable to non-management positions, mid-level and executive management positions and Human Resource departments are studied for their importance to the business identity. or. MGMT 340 Organizational Behavior: This management course focuses on people, the human resource of the firm. Individual and group behavior are explored. Motivational theory and techniques will be examined. Case studies and incidents analysis are used. All of these are required and I will be doing my internship the semester after this (Spring of 2012). So, which class should I take and why? Thanks in advance.

Should I quit my temping job? I need some advice on what to do, please help!? I recently moved to Washington DC and went to HireOne staffing because I heard that a lot of people can get good full time positions by temping first. HireOne sent me to a law firm for an interview for a legal secretary, which I did not have any experience, but I went anyway. After, the temp agency said that they law firm thought that I would be great for an HR position that was opening up, but for the mean time I should work as a low paid temp in the marketing position for only a couple months. Now, 3 1/2 months later, I am still temping with no perment position. Also the temping agency tells me that the HR positon is no longer available to me. I think I should quit because I am being taken advantage of. However, by quitting I have to bail out on a small project that was given to me by the department I am in now. I am not making anywhere near what I am worth and no benefits. I have graduated from college, and have my degree, so I am over qualified for what I am actually doing!

Are Cohen & Grisby Conservatives or Liberals? Are they Democrats or Republicans? PITTSBURGH (AP) — A video highlighting how a Pittsburgh law firm works around U.S. laws to obtain visas for foreign employees was posted on YouTube, quickly fanning the immigration debate. It has even incurred the wrath of a powerful U.S. senator and brought the Department of Labor into the fray. Attorneys for Cohen & Grigsby, one of the largest law firms in the Pittsburgh area, are seen in the video clip explaining to participants at a conference on immigration how to abide by laws that require Americans be given top priority for jobs while still ensuring foreigners are hired. "The goal here of course is to meet the requirements, number one, but also do so as inexpensively as possible, keeping in mind our goal and our goal is clearly not to find a qualified and interested U.S. worker," Lawrence Lebowitz, the firm's vice president of marketing, told the audience in May. http://www.poconorecord.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070623/NEWS/706230330/-1/rss01 Cohen & Grigsby said in a statement that it stood by the substance of the talk, but regretted "the choice of words that was used during a small segment of the seminar." The firm said its statements at the seminar had been "commandeered and misused." The video clip appears to confirm the suspicions of many who accuse companies of placing want-ads in newspapers to show the Department of Labor it is recruiting Americans, while knowing all along that foreigners will be hired to fill the positions. In the video, Lebowitz advises attorneys to advertise in newspapers and use recruitment methods that will not attract qualified applicants. Usually, people can be disqualified on the basis of their resumes, he said. Those who appear to be qualified should be called in for an interview, he said. "Go through the whole process to find a legal basis to disqualify them for this particular position," Jennifer Barton, another Cohen & Grigsby attorney, advised her colleagues. "In most cases that doesn't seem to be a problem." They mean "I wish we would have worded this so people didn't find out we're serving the interests of illegal entities."

Do you have suggestions regarding the at-home business I want to start? I have approximately four years of experience working in the legal industry as a paraprofessional. I have recently taken a job with a new law firm (which I'm excited about due to the nature of the work). However, I am NOT happy about the pay. I have been offered a salary of $400 per week - a serious cut from the $18 per hour that I'm use to making. At the same time, I understand that the economy is not as it use to and that sometimes you have to start a little lower and work your way up. With that said... I've been thinking about starting a legal transcription service from home to supplement my income. I was wondering if anyone had any advice. For example, what do you suggest for marketing? I've been thinking about gaining clients by directly contacting law firms in my area and creating a public image through online outlets (twitter, facebook, youtube, etc.). Any other marketing tools I'm missing out on? As for pay... what do you think is fair? I know that medical transcriptionists use to make 9 cents per line during my mom's time (retired about 8 years ago). What is a fair wage for legal transcriptionists? Any other suggestions?

my business idea, please critique!!!! easy ten points? Ok to start off i work for a law firm in charlottesville, va this law firm specializes in real estate closing's (title insurance), collections, bankruptcies, and civil disputes. My job consists of maintaining all files, be it legal, or real estate, recording, and updating in circuit court clerk offices all over virginia, and a little bit of marketing. My salary for these services is minimum wage (approximatly $400.00 bi-weekly)+ $50.00 per recording, and/or update, on average i have 2 updates or recordings a day, all over virginia. my previous employer was a settlement agency that went out of business following the going under of american homes. looking in the classified adds today i noticed 2 adds in the help wanted section for runners at 2 different law firms in charlottesville...... now for my business idea. I am considering starting a courier business, i would solicit business from law firms, and settlement agencies in and around the charlottesville area.... good idea? bad idea? actually i dont need a loan this business would need very little startup money i already own 2 cars that are good on gas so............... plus anyone can smell a scam a mile a way just by the way you talk.......... so in closing, first learn how to speak english second understand american culture (no american in his right mind is going to apply for a loan through email to a "bank" with a yahoo/hotmail account.......... i mean if i was trying too scam people like you are i would at least try to be more convincing!!

I have been employed with my company as an Escrow Assistant for almost 6 years now..? ..right now, the market is really bad and layoffs have been taking place left and right. Fourtunately, I have been lucky enough to keep my job - but not sure as to how long. My boss mentioned to me that I might want to keep my options open. Here's my question: I was browsing the classifieds, and noticed that a position as a Paralegal/Legal Assistant is currently available at a law firm (that just so happens to be in the same building as I currently work). I pass all the employees on a day to day basis and chit chat with them on occasion. I'm thinking about asking about this position - but not quite sure if they will laugh in my face (due to lack of legal background training, etc.) DO ALL PARALEGAL/LEGAL ASSISTANTS have intensive training to work in this field?

I want to start a new political party, how do i do it ? I would like to do this in the U.K and would like to know every thing that i need to know to start this up. I want to form a new national political party, but I would like some additional information before I dive into the process. A few items that could help me out: 1. What "red tape" must I go through to form this party? More specifically, will I need to register with any federal or state agency(s)? Keep in mind that I will be soliciting (via email, direct mail, and telephone) donations for the party. It might be a relavant fact in answering this question that the party's headquarters will initially be located in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. It will, however, be a national party. Along the same lines of this question, do I need to register as a not-for-profit organization? How? Basically, this question is an attempt to find out what (if any) forms and registrations I need to complete to form a national political party. Please spend the most amount of time on this question because if we as a party do something wrong here we could be breaking the law! I'd hate for the party to fall apart or be sued because we forgot to fill out some random form. 2. On the issue of donations, what are my options for people submitting donations online? What are the best payment service providers on the Internet. I know of PayPal, but are there others that might be better for this particular purpose of political contributions? 3. On that same note, I am preparing an initial e-mail that will be introducing the party and seeking contributions to get the party going. How can I get this email to a large (1mil or more), nationwide group of people? Of course, I'll be sending the email to everyone in my address book, and hopeful that they'll do the same, so on and so on, creating a snowball effect. But, is there also a way to get (or buy) lists of random email addresses that it would be legal to send out an email such as this to? I've looked on the internet, and it appears that one can buy such a thing of lists where people have opted in ... so, what service should I go through to buy this list of email addresses. Which service is the best? Things to consider: I want the email read, not sent directly to people's junk mail box. I want the email sent to as many people as possible up front and then just hope our ideas create a snowball affect. 4. Who should I get to build the party's website, which I hope will be state-of-the art? More specifically, what firms are rated highest in web development? 5. What are some of the top-notch marketing firms that could help in "branding" the party? Here, we're lookign for top-rated firms that specialize in political campaigns. Answers to the questions above would certainly be helpful. However, please feel free to throw any any other information/advice/tips that might be helpful in forming a political party. By no means limit yourself to the specific questions above, because Any and all information on the issue of "forming a political party" would be a great help. I would like to do this in the U.K and would like to know every thing that i need to know to start this up. Can any one help me ?????

Is this legal America appeal Aiding and abetting with sales that benefits fired illegal aliens? Is this legal America appeal "Justice for illegals Immigrants sales benefits fired illegals with either fake, made up or stolen documents ?It was a holiday sale for a singular group of beneficiaries -- illegal immigrants who had been thrown out of work. "It makes me feel less guilty for buying all this stuff," said Dolores Arellano, 19, one of more than 1,000 shoppers who thronged Saturday to the parking lot of American Apparel in downtown Los Angeles. The trendy, L.A.-based clothier sponsored the "Justice for Immigrants" event to benefit some 1,600 employees let go in recent months after federal inspections uncovered discrepancies in their immigration documentation. All the proceeds from the sale will go to the families of the dismissed workers and to organizations representing immigrants, said Peter Schey, an attorney for American Apparel in the immigration case. American Apparel has been a strong proponent of changes in immigration law that would allow many illegal immigrants to attain lawful status. One of its bestselling items is a T-shirt bearing the Legalize LA logo, a motto that also appears on a massive banner adorning the firm's plant in the garment district. Saturday's pre-Christmas sale featured discounts of up to 85% on shirts, sweaters, dresses and sundry other items. The crowd was larger than expected, and workers were constantly carting in boxes of new clothing to be placed on racks and bins spread across the parking lot, flea-market style. Some shoppers waited more than an hour to get in; later, they faced a half-hour wait to pay. The policy was cash only, no returns. Some shoppers were on board with the sale's pro-immigrant thrust. "You're buying things at a good price, but it's for a good cause," Robyn Ybarra, 22, said as she and friends picked through the racks. "I'm for immigration reform." Others seemed more attracted by the prices than the charity. "Everybody's entitled to their opinions, but I feel people should come here legally and by the rules, like we did," said Sahara Ayineh, 19, who said she emigrated from Iran with her family. Her sister, Saba Ayineh, said the prices were favorable compared with those at retail stores. "American Apparel is usually over-priced," she said after purchasing an armful of new clothes. "This is more reasonable." Among the crowds picking through the bins were American Apparel employees and friends of the dismissed workers. "Many of our colleagues have lost their jobs, so it's good to know this will be a help for them," said Carmen Garcia, 37, a native of El Salvador. "It's very hard for them to find jobs now." Although the Obama administration has mostly ended the high-profile work-site immigration raids endorsed by the Bush White House, it has stepped up federal document audits of companies and workers. Firms found to have workers whose documentation does not match official records may be subject to sanctions if they don't act. Supporters call the audits a humane way to enforce immigration law, without the disruption of raids. But critics call the audits inhumane "desktop raids" that still force low-income immigrants out of work. http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-apparel20-2009dec20,0,5888971.story

Isn't it collusion when two opposing businesses allow their members to use services in the opposing club? or use membership passes in the opposing club? For example: If Fitness Club Alpha allowed members from Fitness Club Beta to use its spas and Fitness Club Beta allowed members from Fitness Club Alpha to use its training facilities, with both fitness clubs promoting the exchange of services to their respective members, then isn't that collusion? Collusion is an agreement between two or more persons, sometimes illegal and therefore secretive, to limit open competition by deceiving, misleading, or defrauding others of their legal rights, or to obtain an objective forbidden by law typically by defrauding or gaining an unfair advantage.[citation needed] It is an agreement among firms to divide the market, set prices, or limit production.[1] It can involve "wage fixing, kickbacks, or misrepresenting the independence of the relationship between the colluding parties".[2] In legal terms, all acts effected by collusion are considered void.[3]

Boston Bomb Scare! Rediculous??? so what do you personally feel about that bomb scare thats been all over the news? my opinion is that is was a stupid ploy by a marketing firm and that it wasnt a very good idea considering the world that we live in today, BUT that the authorities are absolutly out of line for making statments such as " am prepared to take any and all legal action against Turner Broadcasting and its affiliates for any and all expenses incurred during the response to today's incidents". AND "We're not going to let this go without looking at the further roots of how this happened to cause the panic in this city," COME ON!!!! it was a bad joke and thats it. How about all u stupid law enforcment officials pull up your skirts!!!!

Where is a good place to live for a young family of 5? Right now we live in the Tampa Bay Area, I have grown up here most of my life..I have grown tired of it. I have lived in Minnesota, Dallas, Texas, Huntsville, Alabama, Savannah, Georgia, Fort Stewart, Georgia, and Columbia, South Carolina. Half of them were due to being in the Army. I enjoyed Dallas ( I lived in Plano, so it was north of the "city") I would love to convince my husband to go out there! Right now we have 2 kids under 4 and I am expecting our newest edition in November. I want to move somewhere that is low crime, affordable, and has a good job market ( I am a legal secretary, my husband is a skilled tradesman (he builds pools for a master pool company) He is going to school for his EMS degree. We both served in the Army for 3 years. I do not have any college experience but I have been working for a law firm here in Florida. I want a safe and affordable place to live, any suggestions?? Utah sounds great and all but I think I would get annoyed with the Mormons, ( I believe in evolution and I don't have a very open religious belief and I do not look down on people for their beliefs) I just took a survey test thing on a website called findyourspot and it gave me about 4 pages of cities and states, the top one is Chattanooga, TN.

Market for solar energy, greenhouse gas analyst and former U.S. environmental attorney in SE Asia? After much delay, I'm ready to make the jump to SE Asia and take up a more simple lifestyle in an area with abundant growth potential. Obviously, the legal market is not open to Westerners and is already saturated with abundant big-firm expats from the U.S. So law is just a skill set for me; I've been working as a solar project developer for the last few years - 30 years old. What would be the best way to get involved with a company in my areas of expertise: solar energy, renewables in general, carbon or other environmental sectors? Most of the job boards I looked at are filled with scammer placement agencies and/or ESL spots. Any suggestions.

Who is Cecelia Lee the Marketing Director of HOK office in Beijing? Cecelia Lee Ms. Xiaoxi Li is a Director located in Beijing, China of Hellmuth, Obata and Kassabaum (”HOK“), the U.S.-headquartered architecture, interior design, engineering, planning and consulting firm. Known to the Western World as Cecilia Lee was born in the Northern part of China in 1969 under the name Xiaoxi Li. Cecilia Lee has routinely engaged in questionable, evasive and deceptive legal tactics; when she was persecuted in US court for crimes and for corrupt practices she did not show up in person in court, event not once or stepped on American soil, she was fearful of being arrested. Cecelia Lee claims that she has obtained Master Degree from Thunderbird School of Global Management (“Thunderbird”), a private business school in the United States, and the first and oldest graduate school specializing in international management and global business and another Master from Arizona State University. When she was challenged in court to produce proof of high education, she did not have any information that can support such claims. In fact, pursuant to an order of the court by which the subpoena was issued to Thunderbird School of Global Management for an order to compel the production documentations relating to Lee’s educational background, Thunderbird response dated to July 10, 2008 indicates that once upon a time in America Cecilia Lee has taken total of 15 curses of prerequisite-classes. Moreover, when she was challenged to prove fraudulent health related claims during pre-trial court hearings, Cecelia Lee provided the court with fraudulent medical records that she obtained by bribing hospital officials in China. Since 2005 Cecelia Lee facing civil charges in the United States of America on attempt to murder, make false statements, and commit perjury; false statements (2 counts); libelous posting of slanderous articles, abduction, and grand theft crime, just to name a few and in a way of example. Her trail dates not set as yet. In 2009 the 40-years-old Cecilia Lee started to prepare for her new cyber crime adventure and she recruited the 20-years-old John Travis Flynn who also known to the public as J. T. Flynn to act as her proxy to execute the “perfect cyber crime” with the help of the 60-years-old photographer, Lou Juaneza, the President of Westhoff Studios. Historical criminology has described the underworld role of Fagin-an adult who forces, seduces or teaches minors to commit crimes for him. In contemporary debates, it is sometimes feared that adolescents cunningly evade criminal law by recruiting younger children to commit offences for them. Cecilia Lee is old enough to be Flynn’s mother and Lou Juaneza, the President of Westhoff Studios, is old enough to be Flynn’s grandmother or perhaps Flynn is young enough to be Lou’s grandchild.

I am finding myself in a difficult situation about my career, questions about being a legal runner? I am currently employeed at a small community bank as the safe deposit box attendant. I am also expected to answer all of the calls, approx 500-600 a day as well as assist that VP of marketing. I am getting so worn out and feel like i am not getting paid enough. This is not a place where you ask for a raise by the way. I have faxed in my resume to a law office to apply for their position as a receptionist/gopher..as they put it...I am just so torn....i feel that even though my job is so stressful...maybe it is more stable.... I am 21 and married and I need to have a job. I feel so torn right now..i just don't know what to do with my life. I talked to my mom and she said she thought it was a good idea for me to apply for the runner job if i was currently unhappy....then i talked to my sister who at one time was a runner at some firm and she said that i don't need to do it, that i would get tired of it really fast. Could someone give me some advice..i am not asking you to make my decsion for me i just want your opinion. I am trying to build a career for myself and i feel very lost right now.

if you had two choices..what would you do? i have an offer to study law at a top school in the uk, and i have also been accepted to the graduate study program at a reputable university to study public policy, with a co-op option (it will open doors to policy analysis and diplomacy or foreign service, all of which pay very well). law school will put me into a great debt, albeit the debt can be easily paid off if i manage to secure article with a top international firm. the grad program will allow me to stay in my country (which can be both good and bad) and will put me in very little debt, whilst the co-op option will make up for all expenses. I will also be done in 1 year max, and be out in the work force. Law school will result in a big debt from a prestigious university and will take away almost 4 years of my youth. but in the end i would be a lawyer with many international options open to me and the potential of earning a huge salary. I have always wanted to go to law school, and have international mobility, but given the legal market is so saturated globally i ma a little worried. I am not from the US, and thus did not apply to law schools in the states. what would you do?

Trying to get unemployment benefits after I quit with good cause? I quit my job as a legal receptionist 5 months ago I tried to work it out with the lawyer I was working for but she was verbally abusive and wasn't paying me for overtime I didn't want to quit because I know how bad the job market is and I had quit a very good job to start working at her law firm after 5 months I haven't had any luck finding a job I just applied for unemployment benefits but now I'm afraid the lawyer is going to deny it that I told her I was quitting because of her inappropriate behavior and I have no proof. Has anyone here got unemployment benefits after they quit with good cause or is there anyone that can give me some kind of advice. I live in New York. Judy I don't have log the only evidence is the time sheet I turned in every week on her office and what she would do she would pay me the hours in a different pay period so she wouldnt pay the time and half. I have the wages statement showing the hours paid but I don't know if she would turn in the time sheets from her office she being a lawyer and all.

My job is making me physically/mentally sick. I want to quit but I can't afford to. Any suggestions? I have been working at a small law firm for about 1 1/2 years. I sit at the front desk and also support the senior partner who is a real jerk. He does nothing but criticizes me..i try so hard and i try to ask him to teach me certain things but he just belittles me and makes fun of me. I went to school for legal assistant and this is my first legal job out of school. I understand that people have to stay late sometimes but if i have something important to do like pay my rent b/c the landlord is coming at 7pm, he says your personal PROBLEMS are not my problem...its an obligation and something that needs to get done, not a problem. he always accuses me of things i didnt do like misplace things when HE did. i never get a compliment from him and he talks down to me in front of everyone else in the office. this job is affecting my health and my relationships outside of work, including with my parents and fiance. they said i have changed and i am always miserable. the only thing is we are in a recession right now and i can't just quit. i have been trying to get interviews but it is very hard. does anyone have any suggestion on what i can do. this job is killing me slowly and ruining my life. when the market was really bad, he told me i was going to be laid off, he would keep telling me every day that is was my last day and i am still here n ow. i did nt know what to expect so i stopped paying my credit cards and some other bills to save and put away for rent...now i am in default with all of my bills and they have been sent off to collection agencies and now i am going bankrupt. this job literally ruined my life...does anyone have any suggestions how i can straighten this whole mess out...i am suicidal at this point.

What is the UK legal market like? Is getting a job as a lawyer in the UK difficult? I have recently been accepted into a good UK law school; it is ranked within the top 10 schools, and has ties to solid firms. How difficult is it to land a job as first year associate? What is the pay like? Here is the catch, I'm not a UK citizen, but I would like to work/practice there, with the possibility of staying; how does this factor into the equation?! Thanks for any help/advice!

I want to quit my job because it is making my life miserable, but we are in a recession. Please advise.? have been working at a small law firm for about 1 1/2 years. I sit at the front desk and also support the senior partner who is a real jerk. He does nothing but criticizes me..i try so hard and i try to ask him to teach me certain things but he just belittles me and makes fun of me. I went to school for legal assistant and this is my first legal job out of school. I understand that people have to stay late sometimes but if i have something important to do like pay my rent b/c the landlord is coming at 7pm, he says your personal PROBLEMS are not my problem...its an obligation and something that needs to get done, not a problem. he always accuses me of things i didnt do like misplace things when HE did. i never get a compliment from him and he talks down to me in front of everyone else in the office. this job is affecting my health and my relationships outside of work, including with my parents and fiance. they said i have changed and i am always miserable. the only thing is we are in a recession right now and i can't just quit. i have been trying to get interviews but it is very hard. does anyone have any suggestion on what i can do. this job is killing me slowly and ruining my life. when the market was really bad, he told me i was going to be laid off, he would keep telling me every day that is was my last day and i am still here n ow. i did nt know what to expect so i stopped paying my credit cards and some other bills to save and put away for rent...now i am in default with all of my bills and they have been sent off to collection agencies and now i am going bankrupt. this job literally ruined my life...does anyone have any suggestions how i can straighten this whole mess out...i am suicidal at this point.

Can you believe that anyone would write a letter like this to the Speaker of the House? Ms. Nancy Pelosi Office of the Speaker H-232, US Capitol Washington, DC 20515 Dear Ms. Pelosi: I write to you out of utter disdain! You are as despicable and un-American as the traitor Jane Fonda. I am a soon to be 65 year-old who has voted in every state and local election since 1966. I have voted for both Republicans and Democrats alike. I have worked on campaigns for both Republicans and Democrats, white and black. I served the country that I love in Vietnam, as my son did in the Middle East. I was awarded two bronze stars. I have been involved in politics since age 6 when my father was campaign manager for a truly great American Congressman, Charles Raper Jonas, who worked for his constituents and his country, and was to be admired, unlike you. You obviously haven’t read the Constitution recently, if ever, the Federalist Papers, or even David McCullough’s book on John Adams. You ought to take the time while riding around in your government provided luxury executive jet to do just that. You represent Socialistic and even Marxist principals that our founding fathers tried to avoid when setting out the capitalistic republican form of government represented by our Constitution. I find it interesting that you and your husband are multi-millionaires with much of your fortune being made as a result of your “public service”. You have controlled legislation that has enhanced your husband’s investments both on and off shore. At the same time you redistributed the wealth of others. Our system of a free market economy is being destroyed by the likes of you, Harry Reid, and now our President. You ride around in a Gulfstream airplane at the tax payer’s expense while criticizing the presidents of companies who produced something for the economy. You add nothing to the economy of the United States; you only subtract therefrom. I would like to suggest that you return to the city of fruitcakes and nuts and eat your husband’s canned tuna and pineapple produced by illegal immigrants and by workers who have been excluded from the protection that 90% of the legal workers in the United States have. I await your defeat in the next election with glee. Don’t ever use the term “un-American” again for protesters who love this country and are exercising their rights upon which this country was founded. By the way, while I served in the Army, I was spit on by the same type of lunatics who support you and who you probably supported in the 60’s and 70’s. You are an embarrassment to all of us who served so that you would have the protected right of free speech to call us un-American. But at the same time, I have the right to write you to notify you that I consider you to be un-American, as do the majority of the people of this formerly great country. You are a true disgrace to most of the people who served this country by offering themselves for public service in the United States Congress. I feel certain your aides will not share this letter with you, but I intend to share it with many. Sincerely, Dennis L. Guthrie This is a legitimate Lawyer and his Law Firm. Check his web site at: www.gdhs.com/index.htm http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/bloggers/2324850/posts http://www.snopes.com/politics/soapbox/guthrie.asp http://www.truthorfiction.com/rumors/g/guthrie-to-pelosi.htm Check his credentials. Then read his letter to Pelosi by clicking on snopes above! Born St. Louis , Missouri , August 21, 1944 Bar Admissions: North Carolina , 1969 U.S. District Court, Eastern, Middle and Western Districts of North Carolina , 1969 U.S. Tax Court Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals Education: Woodford College , 1966 A.B. Mercer University , 1969 J.D. Phi Alpha Delta Vice-Justice, District XIV, 1968 - 1969 Professional Associations and Memberships: North Carolina and American Bar Associations (Member, Sections on: Administrative Law; General Practice; Litigation) 26th Judicial District and North Carolina State Bar Mecklenburg County Bar Association American Association of Justice North Carolina Trial Lawyers Association Captain, U.S. Army, 1969-1971, Vietnam National Defense Medal, 1969 Republic of Viet Nam Service Medal, 1970 Bronze Star Medals (2), 1971 Assistant District Attorney, Mecklenburg County , 1971 - 1974 Charlotte Chamber of Commerce Chairman, Board of Trustees Providence United Methodist Church Board of Directors, Alexander Children's Home Board of Directors, Charlotte Culinary Institute Wofford Alumni Executive Council Scoutmaster, Boy Scouts of America Board of Directors, Boy Scouts of America of Mecklenburg County Board of Directors, Girl Scout Council Life Member, National Eagle Scout Association Life Member, Girl Scouts of America

My husband's therapist wants him to start taking short walks in the community is it a good idea? He is the stay at home partner but has a fear of going anyplace without me. I have to work because I'm the breadwinner. On weekends he's really brave about leaving our apartment and we love to go to the beach or the park. The problem is that he will never go to those places alone without me accompanying him. Sometimes I feel like his mother but I really don't mind because I love him soooo much. On Sunday we were at the beach and I needed to use the restroom. It's usually a fairly fast trip, go in sit down , take care of business and leave again. This time there were some females preening and carrying on and doing who knows what and they held everyone up. I had to wait in line and when I got back he was shaking and looked a mess. He practically jumped at me and started tearing up and said he was really worried about me. I asked him why didn't he go over to the building with the restrooms and he said he didn't feel like getting up. He feels safe driving to the market and to his bi weekly therapy appointments but will not go anywhere else Without Me. He was sexually and physically abused by his step father from childhood through adolescence. I met him in the 9th grade and I wanted my parents to let him live with us because the physical and mental abuse was done openly. He recently disclosed the Horrors of the sexual abuse which no one knew about before. My parents refused for legal reasons to allow him to stay with us. When we both graduated from high school I decided that I was going to take him away from the horrors that we expreirnced and we immediately got married. I was thinking instead of short walks could he meet me at McDonalds or Burger King which are about half way home from my work. I could call him when I am leaving work. I walk to work and home becasue my job is alow paying clerical job in a law firm and we try to save anyway we can. McDonald's I believe has iced tea so it would not cost too much for him and I to buy drink there. Plus it would be fun to share a drink together like two love sick lovebirds lol lolo.

What happens on a second mortgage default? I got behind on my second mortgage (my first is current) after my wife lost her job but she has recently re-gained employment. Now the second has been turned over to a law firm, who is asking for us to catch up payments (with no loan forebearance, modification of any kind) and if we don't comply, they will continue with the legal process, which I understand to be a judgment. What happens at this point? I have been told by some that if a judgment is entered by your second mortgage lender, they can't really do much unless the house sells at some point. Is this correct? With the current market conditions, my house is underwater, so "short-selling" would only benefit the first mortgage lender. Can they attempt to seize assets (what little I have)?

who can help me finish this Econ Assignment (part 2)? Question 15 The “Law of Diminishing Returns” is a. a legal statute in the U.S. only b. a legal statute in the U.S., the European Union, and in other developed countries around the world c. not a statute law, but rather a precident established in courts through case law d. not a legal statute at all but rather an old terms for a well established empirical observation (that is, an observation about how things are in the real world) e. a theoretical proposition with very little relevance for the real world Question 16 Which of the following was, according to Thomas Malthus, the reason why food production could not possibly keep up with the growth of population? a. economies of scale b. diseconomies of scale c. the Law of Diminishing Returns d. the Law of Averages e. Murphy’s Law (that is, Whatever can go wrong will go wrong) Question 17 At your current output level, your firm’s marginal costs are greater than its average variable costs. If you increase output, you should expect your average variable costs to a. fall b. increase c. stay the same d. turn negative e. change, but there is too little information here to say how they will change Question 18 All of your firm’s inputs are variable, that is, you can consider any scale of operation. What economic time period is your firm operating in? ___________________________ Question 19 Chapter Seven introduces the study of market structures. Although we have not covered this in class yet, you should be able to identify the different types of market structures form the description of their features in the text. Which market structure has many small firms selling differentiated products? a. Pure or Perfect Competition b. Oligopoly c. Monopoly d. Monopolistic Competition Question 20 Chapter Seven introduces the study of market structures. Although we have not covered this in class yet, you should be able to identify the different types of market structures form the description of their features in the text. Which market structure has a few very large sellers who dominate their market? a. Pure or Perfect Competition b. Oligopoly c. Monopoly d. Monopolistic Competition Question 21 If a firm’s long run average costs are increasing as scale increases, the firm must a. heave encountered economies of scale b. must have encountered diseconomies of scale c. must have reached the point of diminishing returns d. must have inverted its implicit costs Question 22 Chapter Seven introduces the study of market structures. Although we have not covered this in class yet, you should be able to identify the different types of market structures form the description of their features in the text. Which market structure has virtually no barriers to entry? a. Pure or Perfect Competition b. Oligopoly c. Monopoly d. Monopolistic Competition Question 23 At the beginning of this course, we noted different types of competition. One type of competition was the “competition of capitals.” If firms earn positive economic profits, the competition of capitals would a. stop working b. bring about a government antitrust suit c. cause firms in a free open market to enter the industry d. cause firms in a free open market to exit the industry e. reduce interest rates Question 24 Anything that increases productivity will a. increase cost b. decrease cost c. have no effect on cost because productivity is measured in physical units while cost is measured in financial units (e.g., dollars) d. have an effect on cost, but the direction and extent cannot be determined without more information e. reduce the demand for labor

Economics! I need help!? 3) Which of the following is an example of a monopoly? a) you don’t want to buy cable from the one company that provides cable to your city so you are stuck getting a satellite dish b) while there are a lot of appliance stores in the big city threw hours away from you, they are too far to travel to so you buy your new refrigerator from the one store locally that sells appliances c) If you want to buy a new novel, your only choices are to buy from the one local bookstore in your town or to get on the internet and buy from any of the thousands of online places. d) All of the above would be considered examples of monopoly. 4) Barriers to entry a) result in an existing firm having very little market power. b) Are only legal if they are a result of one firm being protected by law from competition c) Includes anything that makes producing and selling output more difficult for a new firm than an existing firm. d) All of the above

I need help! please could you help? 3)Which of the following is an example of a monopoly? a)you don’t want to buy cable from the one company that provides cable to your city so you are stuck getting a satellite dish b)while there are a lot of appliance stores in the big city threw hours away from you, they are too far to travel to so you buy your new refrigerator from the one store locally that sells appliances c)If you want to buy a new novel, your only choices are to buy from the one local bookstore in your town or to get on the internet and buy from any of the thousands of online places. d)All of the above would be considered examples of monopoly. 4)Barriers to entry a)result in an existing firm having very little market power. b)Are only legal if they are a result of one firm being protected by law from competition c)Includes anything that makes producing and selling output more difficult for a new firm than an existing firm. d)All of the above

Microeconomics homework help PLEASE? 1. Which of the following is a positive statement? a. an increase in college tuition is not fair to students b. a recession causes enrollments at universities to increase. c. university book store prices are too high d. parking tickets on campus impose an excessive fee 2.Huey has eaten two hamburgers and is considering a third. The marginal benefit in his decision is the pleasure from consuming... a. the two previous hamburgers b. all three hamburgers c. just the third hamburger d. just the second hamburger 3. Mothers Against Drunk Driving (MADD) campaigned to increase the legal penalties of drunk driving. The successful campaign ______ of drunk driving. a. increased the marginal benefit b. decreased the marginal benefit c. increased the marginal cost d. decreased the marginal cost 4. According to the circular flow model, a. dollars flow from households into the factor markets b. dollars flow from the firms into the factor markets c. goods flow from households into the goods markets d. goods flow from firms into the factor markets 5. While moving along a production possibilities frontier, the amount of a. labor and technology is fixed, but capital varies b. capital varies and the amount of labor varies c. labor varies but the level of technology is fixed d. labor, capital and technology are fixed 6. Assume that an association of young workers has lobbied congress to require that all workers retire once they reach the age of fifty. what impact would this law have on the nation's production possibilities frontier? a. no impact at all b. the level of unemployment would decrease so the production possibilities frontier would shift outward c. the nation would move to a new position on its production possibilities frontier but the frontier itself would not shift d. the production possibilities frontier would shift inward. 7.in the 1930’s, the U.S. economy suffered severely, with unemployment rates of 20 percent. During World War II in the early 1940’s, Americans found that their living standards improved relative to what it had been in the recent past because a.production became more efficient in the war. b.the federal government forced Americans to produce more of both guns and butter. c.the economy put unemployed resources to work during the war. d.There is no way to explain this occurrence. thanks<3

Can you give me some career ideas? I have hit a wall in my job search and I would love your help! I was a journalism/advertising major in undergradute. I went to a good state school in the Midwest and graduated in the top 1/3rd. I learned a great deal about writing, branding, marketing, sales and design (among other things). However, I decided I wanted to go to law school. I went to another good school in the midwest and finished in the middle of my class. I then moved to California and took the bar and passed on the first try. My legal experiences include: clerking for a year for a state civil law judge, interning for a British criminal law barrister, clerking for a medical malpractice defense firm, and working as a legal contract temp attorney on class action and patent cases. My other talents include photography, writing, and doing just about anything on a computer. So my question is, what advice do you have for potential careers, both traditional and non-traditional? All suggestions are welcome

economics homework help? 1. Which of the following is one of the assumptions upon which the theory of monopolistic competition is built? (2 points) a.There are many sellers b.There are few buyers c.It is difficult to enter the industry d.Each firm in the industry produces a homogeneous product 2. The most significant barrier to entry into an oligopolistic market is most likely (2 points) a.patent rights b.exclusive ownership of essential resources c.legal barriers d.economies of scale 3. The key behavioral assumption of the cartel theory is that oligopolists in an industry (2 points) a.try to maximize revenue instead of profits b.act as if they are perfect monopolistic competitors c.act in a manner consistent with there being only one firm in the industry d.try to manipulate government into subsidizing their activities 4. (T/F) Oligopolies represent an industry having few firms and significant barriers to entry (2 points) a.True b.False 5. The top firm in an industry determines price and all other firms take this price as given. This is the behavioral assumption of the (2 points) a.kinked demand curve theory b.price leadership theory c.both the cartel and price leadership theories d.monopolist competitive theory 6. (T/F) In the short run, the monopolistically competitive firm will produce at the point where MR = MC (2 points) a.True b.False 7. The monopolistic competitor (2 points) a.is a price searcher b.is a price taker c.is a mix between a price taker and a price searcher d.produces that quantity of output at which MR > MC 8. The prisoner’s dilemma game illustrates that (2 points) a.what is good for you and me individually may be bad for us collectively b.what is good for me is good for you c.cartels are likely to be stable in the long run d.none of the above are correct 9. If one airline lowers its price, game theory suggests that (2 points) a.the other airlines will do nothing b.the other airlines will immediately do the same to minimize profits c.the other airlines will immediately do the same to minimize the effect of the first moving airline on their profits d.the other airlines will leave the industry 10. A monopolistic competitor has a demand curve that is (2 points) a.more elastic than a perfectly competitive firm b.less elastic than a monopoly firm c.less elastic than a perfectly competitive firm d.both a and b 11. Concentration ratios are not perfect guides to industry concentration because they do not (2 points) a.take into account foreign competition and competition from substitute goods b.adjust for inflation c.adjust for quality of products d.adjust for price 12. If a single firm lowers price, other firms will do likewise, but if a single firm raises price, other firms will not necessarily follow suite. This is the behavioral assumption in the (2 points) a.cartel theory b.price leadership theory c.kinked demand curve theory d.price discrimination theory 13. Which of the following is an example of an oligopoly (2 points) a.a law partnership b.a local gas company c.a dental firm d.Ford Motor Company 14. Product differentiation is most likely a form of (2 points) a.advertising b.nonprice competition c.lowering variable costs d.lowering the fixed costs to total cost ratio 15. Which of the following statements is true? (2 points) a.One of the developers of contestable markets theory is William Baldwin. b.Orthodox market structure theory places much greater weight than contestable markets theory on the number of firms in an industry as a major factor in determining a firm’s behavior. c.Contestable markets theory emphasizes product differentiation; orthodox market structure theory does not. d.Contestable markets theory emphasizes nonprice competition; orthodox market structure theory does not. I have completed all of it I got c,a,b,a,b,b,d,d,b,c,c,c,d,b,d. so no, it is homework help, because if i am wrong i will find out b4 my test. which is Wednesday, and i will not find out the answers from the teacher until tht day or later on.

please help me with these? 1. The idea behind U.S. antitrust laws is to 1. Preserve market competition. 2. Protect current competitors. 3. Protect consumer interests. 4. Protect producer interests. 5. Both A and C. 2. What are the advantages of auctioning off new rights? 1. The government can use the proceeds to fund worthwhile projects. 2. The winning bidders are likely to be the most efficient users. 3. The winning bidders can easily flip the rights for instant profits. 4. All of the above. 5. Both A and B. 3. The original government intention of limiting taxi licenses was to 1. Make cab rides too expensive to force passengers into using mass transit systems. 2. Guarantee reasonable earnings to taxi operators in exchange for government regulation on safety and quality. 3. Create windfall profit for taxi operators. 4. Inflate license and fare prices. 4. Milk in the U.S. is unnecessarily expensive because 1. government-supported price discourages vertical integration of the milk industry. 2. there is an excess demand for milk. 3. milk prices are subject to price control. 4. milk farmers do not produce enough milk. 5. In what ways is occupational licensing similar to single pricing? 1. It excludes all those who cannot meet that minimum skill or price level. 2. It confers too much benefit to those who have no difficulty in meeting the minimum skill or price level. 3. There is no similarity between the two. 4. Both A and B. 6. Collusion among producers to raise price and restrict output is likely to be successful if 1. The number of producers is small. 2. The product is homogeneous. 3. There is no anti-trust law against it. 4. All of the above. 5. Both A and C. 7. Attempts to reduce excess capacity through mergers violate (may violate) U.S. antitrust laws if 1. there is no increase in concentration. 2. they are likely to result in higher prices. 3. the takeover attempts are hostile. 4. The Justice Department is ideologically sympathetic. 8. Government regulation 1. does not confer any legal immunity to the regulated industries. 2. is never needed in a free market. 3. is generally welcome by industries. 4. may benefit larger firms who are better able to shoulder the burden of regulation. 9. Price-fixing 1. is a form of capacity reduction. 2. is not against the U.S. antitrust law. 3. is a survival strategy for mature industries producing homogeneous products with large scale-economy and excess capacity. 4. increases consumer surplus. 10. Trade protection 1. Is likely to be temporary. 2. Is consistent with the principle of comparative advantage. 3. Has made domestic industries stronger. 4. Benefits the few at the expense of the many.

When was the Sherman Antitrust Act passed? ? When was the Sherman Antitrust Act passed? A)1762 B)1969 C)1890 D)1900 What is a trust? 1)A trust is a combination of firms or corporations formed by a legal agreement; especially one that reduces or threatens to reduce competition. 2)A trust is a bond between two friends that makes the friends really happy. 3)A trust is a law that prohibits companies from buying products The Federal Trade Commission, an independent agency of the U.S. government, is charged with____________________________. 1)regulating all trade between the U.S. and El Salvador 2)preventing business owners, such as Bill Gates, from making too much money 3)keeping American business competition free and fair Who started the Sherman Antitrust Act? 1)General Sherman 2)Senator John Sherman 3)Sherman Helmsley User: Aaron Burch In Course: American History V8 ( 2204) Instructor: Patrick Crews 07.06 Sherman Antitrust Act When was the Sherman Antitrust Act passed? 1762 1969 1890 1900 POINT VALUE: 9.0 points What is a trust? A trust is a combination of firms or corporations formed by a legal agreement; especially one that reduces or threatens to reduce competition. A trust is a bond between two friends that makes the friends really happy. A trust is a law that prohibits companies from buying products POINT VALUE: 9.0 points The Federal Trade Commission, an independent agency of the U.S. government, is charged with____________________________. regulating all trade between the U.S. and El Salvador preventing business owners, such as Bill Gates, from making too much money keeping American business competition free and fair POINT VALUE: 9.0 points Who started the Sherman Antitrust Act? General Sherman Senator John Sherman Sherman Helmsley POINT VALUE: 9.0 points The following are three anticompetitive techniques used by corporations to gain market dominance: *Forcing customers to sign long-term contracts *Forcing customers to buy unwanted products in order to receive other goods *Buying out competitors True False The following corporations have been involved in historic antitrust cases: AT&T, Standard Oil, and Burger King. True False What company in 1911 was found by the Supreme Court to be in violation of the Sherman Antitrust Act? 1)Microsoft 2)U.S. Steel 3)Standard Oil This company on June 7, 2000 was ordered to be broken up for violating antitrust laws. This was the first landmark decree since the one with AT&T in 1982. Nearly one year later, a federal appeals court reversed the decree, but still found that this corporation broke antitrust laws. 1)Microsoft 2)U.S. Steel 3)Standard Oil Who owned and operated Standard Oil? 1)Bill Gates 2)John D. Rockefeller 3)P Morgan This law was enacted in 1914 by the United States Congress to clarify and strengthen the Sherman Antitrust Act. 1)The Melgard Antitrust Act 2)The Harden Antitrust Act 3)The Clayton Antitrust Act

Has there ever been any Members From ISAC Congress indited on Anti-trust Charges? Collusion is an agreement, usually secretive, which occurs between two or more persons to deceive, mislead, or defraud others of their legal rights, or to obtain an objective forbidden by law typically involving fraud or gaining an unfair advantage. It can involve "wage fixing, kickbacks, or misrepresenting the independence of the relationship between the colluding parties."[1] All acts affected by collusion are considered void.[2] In the study of economics and market competition, collusion takes place within an industry when rival companies cooperate for their mutual benefit. Collusion most often takes place within the market form of oligopoly, where the decision of a few firms to collude can significantly impact the market as a whole. Cartels are a special case of explicit collusion. Collusion which is not overt, on the other hand, is known as tacit collusion. Practices that facilitate tacit collusion include: Uniform prices A penalty for price discounts Advance notice of price changes Information exchange riations According to neoclassical price-determination theory and game theory, the independence of suppliers forces prices to their minimum, increasing efficiency and decreasing the price determining ability of each individual firm. However, if firms collude to increase prices loss of sales is minimized as consumers lack alternative choices at lower prices. This benefits the colluding firms at the cost of efficiency to society. One variation of this traditional theory is the theory of kinked demand. Firms face a kinked demand curve if, when one firm decreases its price, other firms will follow suit in order to maintain sales, and when one firm increases its price, its rivals are unlikely to follow, as they would lose the sales' gains that they would otherwise get by holding prices at the previous level. Kinked demand potentially fosters supra-competitive prices because any one firm would receive a reduced benefit from cutting price, as opposed to the benefits accruing under neoclassical theory and certain game theoretic models such as Bertrand competition. In the study of economics and market competition, collusion takes place within an industry when rival companies cooperate for their mutual benefit. Collusion most often takes place within the market form of oligopoly, where the decision of a few firms to collude can significantly impact the market as a whole. Cartels are a special case of explicit collusion. Collusion which is not overt, on the other hand, is known as tacit collusion.

Investment Advisors/Investment Bankers please help!? I recently graduated from a prestigious Liberal arts college with a B.A (Honors) in Political Science and History, and have been offered an entry level Marketing Assistant position for a leading Investment Management firm. I would like to know how difficult it is for liberal arts majors (specially women) to break into the investment industry. Is it possible for me to move up to the position of an investment advisor later on? I do not have any background in finance with the excepion of a first year economics course i took in undergrad (and thoroughly enjoyed), but i do have a very keen interest in learning about the capital markets. Is it possible for me to move up to the position of an investment advisor? how difficult is the profession, is it similar to investment banking and what is the income potential? also i know that most IA's make money through comission, does this also apply if you are workng for a top full service brokerage firm? I am in a bit of a dillema because i'm on my gap year and this is a good employment/learning opportunity. Initially i wanted to pursue law but have been having second thoughts about a legal career. Please advise! Cheers.

Help Me With This Econ Question? Rhonda Rite has heard of Larry’s client relation problems and decides to open a competing law office in Goldville. That office will have the same constant cost structure as Larry’s with Marginal cost = $ 150 per billable hour. Both Rhonda and Larry compete as Cournot duopolists on the output of billable hours. The annual demand for legal services in Goldville continues to be P = 1000 – x/2, where p = hourly billable rate and x = billable hour output. With the arrival of Rhonda’s firm, the input markets change and both lawyers now are facing an increasing cost environment. If the new total cost =(x/1000)x where x = billable hour output (i)What will be Larry’s and Rhonda’s profit maximizing billable rate if they charge the same hourly rate? (ii)Which clients are worse off under increasing costs over constant costs and by how much? (iii)How much are Larry’s profits? (iv)How much are Rhonda’s profits? (v)How much is the producer surplus in the increasing cost duopoly?

need career change advice? i've been working in legal industry for a bit more than 2 years, i didn't stud law, somehow got to this field by accident, time flies and i realized i don't want to develop further in legal, since i am not really interested in this, i want to do marketing/PR, although my current job does have chance for me to do sth in marketing, after all it's a very small portion of my job, and not professional as well. problem is if i change industry, work in a PR firm, i will need to start basically from zero. get paid like fresh graduate, since i didn't study marketing either, but i intend to do so. if i stay at current job i am sure will get a pay raise very soon, although i am not getting paid what i deserve here, 2 years certainly worth more than a freshman. i've also talked to a few friends, i am 25, they say i am still young to change to sth i like, otherwise even though i get paid more in legal, i am not happy in the end, i didn't chose this major because i don't like it, now i am in this industry but still not interested in studying this, so the longer i stay the more i waste my time. just worried i wont be used to a life like a fresh graduate if i change to marketing. with less pay i will have to move to lower cost place etc. advice please.

Please Help With Economics ASAP? 1. Suppose an excise tax is imposed on product X. We would expect this tax to: A) increase the demand for complementary good Y and decrease the demand for substitute product Z. B) decrease the demand for complementary good Y and increase the demand for substitute product Z. C) increase the demands for both complementary good Y and substitute product Z. D) decrease the demands for both complementary good Y and substitute product Z. 2. If consumers are willing to pay a higher price than previously for each level of output, we can say that that following has occurred: A) a decrease in demand. C) a decrease in supply. B) an increase in demand. D) an increase in supply. 3. Assume product A is an input in the production of product B. In turn product B is a complement to product C. We can expect a decrease in the price of A to: A) increase the supply of B and increase the demand for C. B) decrease the supply of B and increase the demand for C. C) decrease the supply of B and decrease the demand for C. D) increase the supply of B and decrease the demand for C. 4. (Consider This) Ticket scalping implies that: A) event sponsors have established ticket prices at above-equilibrium levels. B) an event is not likely to be sold out. C) event sponsors have established ticket prices at below-equilibrium levels. D) the demand for tickets has fallen between the time tickets were originally sold and the event takes place. 5. (Consider This) Ticket scalping is likely to: A) produce a less interested audience. C) reduce the well-being of ticket sellers. B) reduce the well-being of ticket buyers. D) produce a more interested audience. 6. (Consider This) In 1994 Ford sold 500,000 Escorts at an average price of $7,200 per car; in 1995, 600,000 Escorts were sold at an average price of $7,500 per car. These statements: A) suggest that the demand for Escorts decreased between 1994 and 1995. B) imply that Escorts are an inferior good. C) suggest that the demand for Escorts increased between 1994 and 1995. D) constitute an exception to the law of demand in that they suggest an upsloping demand curve. 7. (Consider This) Since their introduction, prices of DVD players have fallen and the quantity purchased has increased. These statements: A) suggest that the supply of DVD players has increased. B) suggest that the demand for DVD players has increased. C) constitute an exception to the law of demand in that they suggest an upward sloping demand curve. D) constitute an exception to the law of supply in that they suggest a downward sloping supply curve 8. An effective price floor will: A) force some firms in this industry to go out of business. B) result in a product surplus. C) result in a product shortage. D) clear the market. 9. . If an effective ceiling price is placed on hamburgers then: A) the quantity demanded will exceed the quantity supplied. B) a black market for hamburger may evolve. C) that consumers may want government to ration hamburger. D) all of the above are likely outcomes. 10. If a legal ceiling price is set above the equilibrium price: A) a shortage of the product will occur. B) a surplus of the product will occur. C) a black market will evolve. D) neither the equilibrium price nor equilibrium quantity will be affected. Thanks for all the help =]

Economics Help ASAP Please? 1. Suppose an excise tax is imposed on product X. We would expect this tax to: A) increase the demand for complementary good Y and decrease the demand for substitute product Z. B) decrease the demand for complementary good Y and increase the demand for substitute product Z. C) increase the demands for both complementary good Y and substitute product Z. D) decrease the demands for both complementary good Y and substitute product Z. 2. If consumers are willing to pay a higher price than previously for each level of output, we can say that that following has occurred: A) a decrease in demand. C) a decrease in supply. B) an increase in demand. D) an increase in supply. 3. Assume product A is an input in the production of product B. In turn product B is a complement to product C. We can expect a decrease in the price of A to: A) increase the supply of B and increase the demand for C. B) decrease the supply of B and increase the demand for C. C) decrease the supply of B and decrease the demand for C. D) increase the supply of B and decrease the demand for C. 4. (Consider This) Ticket scalping implies that: A) event sponsors have established ticket prices at above-equilibrium levels. B) an event is not likely to be sold out. C) event sponsors have established ticket prices at below-equilibrium levels. D) the demand for tickets has fallen between the time tickets were originally sold and the event takes place. 5. (Consider This) Ticket scalping is likely to: A) produce a less interested audience. C) reduce the well-being of ticket sellers. B) reduce the well-being of ticket buyers. D) produce a more interested audience. 6. (Consider This) In 1994 Ford sold 500,000 Escorts at an average price of $7,200 per car; in 1995, 600,000 Escorts were sold at an average price of $7,500 per car. These statements: A) suggest that the demand for Escorts decreased between 1994 and 1995. B) imply that Escorts are an inferior good. C) suggest that the demand for Escorts increased between 1994 and 1995. D) constitute an exception to the law of demand in that they suggest an upsloping demand curve. 7. (Consider This) Since their introduction, prices of DVD players have fallen and the quantity purchased has increased. These statements: A) suggest that the supply of DVD players has increased. B) suggest that the demand for DVD players has increased. C) constitute an exception to the law of demand in that they suggest an upward sloping demand curve. D) constitute an exception to the law of supply in that they suggest a downward sloping supply curve 8. An effective price floor will: A) force some firms in this industry to go out of business. B) result in a product surplus. C) result in a product shortage. D) clear the market. 9. . If an effective ceiling price is placed on hamburgers then: A) the quantity demanded will exceed the quantity supplied. B) a black market for hamburger may evolve. C) that consumers may want government to ration hamburger. D) all of the above are likely outcomes. 10. If a legal ceiling price is set above the equilibrium price: A) a shortage of the product will occur. B) a surplus of the product will occur. C) a black market will evolve. D) neither the equilibrium price nor equilibrium quantity will be affected. Thanks for all the help =]

hey i had asked for help earlier?? but for some reason it didnt post my questions can someone help? 1. what factor has the greatest influence on elasticity and inelasticity of supply? a. profit b. labor c. time d. financing 2. which of the following is an example of the way in which the use of technology can lower the cost of producing an item? a. the importing of fresh vegetables from South America rather than using canned vegetables b. the making of breads and pasteries in local shops rather than large bakeries c. the use of e-mail to replace slower surface mail d. the delivery costs of gasoline to the consumer by diesel trucks 3. what happens when wages are set above the equilibrium level by law? a. firms tend to try to break the law and hire people at the equilibrium level b. firms employ MORE workers than they would at the equilibrium wage c. firms employ FEWER workers than they would at the equilibrium wage d. firms hire more workers but fewer hours than they would at the equilibrium wage 4. why did communist government use a command economic system for many years? a. as a way to avoid the expense and difficulties of a free market b. as a method of keeping consumers from getting what they wanted c. to limit the costs of production of many goods d. in an attempt to creat a society in which everyone was equal 5. how does a company arrange to sell its products to people who are unwilling to pay for the top price for them? a. by allowing rebates to some perferred customers who buy a lot of goods b. by charging each customer the maximum amount they are willing to pay c. by charging different prices according to the group to which the buyer belongs d. by changing the product and selling a lesser one to the people who are unwilling to pay for the top product 6. when the government deregulates a product or service, what happens to it? a. the product or service is available to more people b. the product or service becomes cheaper c. some government regulations over the industry are eleminated d. government control over the industry is stopped 7. why does the goverment sometimes give monoply power to a company by issuing a patent? a. the government does not want competition for the product b. the company makes a product better than anyone else's c. the company pays the government for the patent d. the company can then profit from their research without competition 8. what percentage of businesses are sole proprietorship? a. 25% b 40% c. 60% d. 75% 9. which of the following represents the percentage of all U.S businesses that are corporations, and the percentage of all goods that those corporations sell? a. 10% of businesses 50% of goods sold b. 20% of businesses 90% of goods sold c. 50% of businesses 75% of goods sold d. 20% of businesses 50% of goods sold 10. what is a fringe benefit? a. a cash payment for casual work b. a business other than sales or marketing c. a payment other than wages or saleries. d. an accounting term meaning profits 11. which of the following is a business organization owned by a group of people for their mutual benefit? a. a coorperative b. a lavor union c. a limited liability partnership d. a professional organization 12. what are royalties? a. fees paid to celebrities for using their names b. fees paid to law firms and accountants c. a percentage of profits paid to the government d. a percentage of earnings paid for a franchise 13. what is collective bargaining? a. union and company representatives meeting to negotiate a new labor contract b. an organization of workers representing several different occupations c. an agreement to allow everyone to be part of the labor negotiating process d. a situation in which the righs of labor have been set aside 14. how are wages for a particular job determined? a. by advertisments in the news paper or on line b. by the equilibrium between the supply and demand for workers for that job c. by the amount of inflation in the economy d. by the federal wage and hour department 15. when did labor unions begin to gain some legal rights in the United States? a. 1900's b. 1920's c. 1930's d. 1950's

Which lawyer do I use to get money back from crooked stock broker? recieved a call a couple of months ago, May 5, from someone at BasicInvestors in New York telling me to buy a stock call Agfeed, cymbol FEED. They told me it would double in two months because it is the biggest company in China. The stock has lost half it value. The broker insists that I buy more on margin to 'double down' then the stock went down again and I got a margin call and was told I had to sell some shares. I did that and I recieved another call telling me I had to sell more share, which I did. Then I got a letter that said the clearing house had sold me out. I was basicaly charged three times commission to sell shares that I was talked into buying. I have lost half my money and this broker keeps telling me to buy more. I call FINRA and they say they look into it. I started looking for lawyer and found the lawyers Shepherd Smith & Edwards, LLP have a whole page about the crooks at Basic Investors and even have Basic Investors Complaint and Legal Claims Center. They say that Basic Investors of NY was fined $25,000 FINRA Reports Reporting Source: Regulator Allegations: SEC RULES 11AC1-4, 15C2-11, NASD RULES 2110, 3010, 4632, 4642, 6620, 6740 - BASIC INVESTORS, INC. FAILED TO DISPLAY IMMEDIATELY CUSTOMER LIMIT ORDERS IN LISTED SECURITIES IN ITS PUBLIC QUOTATION, WHEN EACH SUCH ORDER WAS AT A PRICE THAT WOULD HAVE IMPROVED THE FIRM'S BID OR OFFER IN EACH SUCH SECURITY; OR WHEN THE ORDER WAS PRICED EQUAL TO THE FIRM'S BID OR OFFER AND THE NATIONAL BEST BID OR OFFER FOR EACH SUCH SECURITY, AND THE SIZE OF THE ORDER REPRESENTED MORE THAN A DE MINIMIS CHANGE IN RELATION TO THE SIZE ASSOCIATED WITH THE FIRM'S BID OR OFFER IN EACH SUCH SECURITY; THE FIRM INCORRECTLY REPORTED TO THE NASDAQ MARKET CENTER (NMC) THE SECOND LEG OF "RISKLESS" PRINCIPAL TRANSCTION(S) IN NNM SECURITIES; "RISKLESS PRINCIPAL TRANSACTIONS IN SMALLCAP SECURITIES; "RISKLESS" PRINCIPAL TRANSACTION(S) IN OTC SECURITIES BECAUSE IT INCORRECTLY DESIGNATED THE CAPACITY OF SUCH TRANSACTION(S) AS "PRINCIPAL." THE FIRM PUBLISHED QUOTATIONS FOR OTC EQUITY SECURITIES OR NON-EXCHANGE-LISTED SECURITIES OR, DIRECTLY OR INDIRECTLY, SUBMITTED SUCH QUOTATIONS FOR PUBLICATION IN A QUOTATION MEDIUM, THE PINK SHEETS, AND DID NOT HAVE IN ITS RECORDS THE DOCUMENTATION REQUIRED BY SEC RULE 15C2-11(A)("PARAGRAPH (A) INFORMATION"); DID NOT HAVE A REASONABLE BASIS UNDER THE CIRCUMSTANCES FOR BELIEVING THE PARAGRAPH(A) INFORMATION WAS ACCURATE IN ALL MATERIAL ASPECTS; AND DID NOT HAVE A REASONABLE BASIS UNDER THE CIRCUMSTANCES FOR BELIEVING THAT THE SOURCES OF THE PARAGRAPH (A) INFORMATION WERE RELIABLE. THE QUOTATIONS DID NOT REPRESENT A CUSTOMER'S INDICATION OF UNSOLICITED INTEREST. FOR EACH OF THESE QUOTATIONS, THE FIRM FAILED TO FILE A FORM 211 WITH NASD AT LEAST THREE BUSINESS DAYS BEFORE ITS QUOTATIONS WERE PUBLISHED OR DISPLAYED IN A QUOTATION MEDIUM. [CONTINUED IN COMMENTS.] Date Initiated: 05/03/2007 Docket/Case Number: 20050003265-01 Resolution Date: 05/03/2007 Sanctions Ordered: Censure Monetary/Fine $25,000.00 Other Sanctions Ordered: UNDERTAKING Sanction Details: WITHOUT ADMITTING OR DENYING THE FINDINGS, THE FIRM CONSENTED TO THE DESCRIBED SANCTIONS AND TO THE ENTRY OF FINDINGS; THEREFORE, THE FIRM IS CENSURED, FINED $25,000 AND REQUIRED TO REVISE THE FIRM'S WRITTEN SUPERVISORY PROCEDURES REGARDING COMPLIANCE WITH DISCLOSURE OF ORDER EXECUTION INFORMATION, RISKLESS PRINCIPAL TRADE REPORTING, SALES IN THRESHOLD SECURITIES, BOOKS AND RECORDS, THE QUOTATION OF NON-EXCHANGE-LISTED SECURITIES, AND BID TEST COMPLIANCE REQUIREMENTS WITHIN 30 BUSINESS DAYS OF ACCEPTANCE OF THIS AWC BY THE NAC. Summary: THE FIRM'S SUPERVISORY SYSTEM DID NOT PROVIDE FOR SUPERVISION REASONABLY DESIGNED TO ACHIEVE COMPLIANCE WITH APPLICABLE SECURITIES LAWS, REGULATIONS, AND NASD RULES CONCERNING COMPLIANCE WITH DISCLOSURE OF ORDER EXECUTION INFORMATION, RISKLESS PRINCIPAL TRADE REPORTING, SALES IN THRESHOLD SECURITIES, BOOKS AND RECORDS, AND THE QUOTATION OF NON-EXCHANGE-LISTED SECURITIES. THE FIRM FAILED TO PROVIDE DOCUMENTARY EVIDENCE THAT IT PERFORMED THE SUPERVISORY REVIEWS SET FORTH IN ITS WRITTEN SUPERVISORY PROCEDURES CONCERNING THE REQUREMENTS OF BID TEST COMPLIANCE DURING A MONTH. Should I hire this law firm? They seem to know all about the crooks that took my money at Basic Investors but I do not know how good they are as lawyers? Do anyone know this firm? I have never had to get lawyer for something likek this before. thanks for help

Is this your dear sweet union supporting Hillary? In 1986, when Hillary was first lady of Arkansas, she was put on the board of Wal-Mart. Officials at the time said she wasn't filling a vacancy. In May 1992, as Hubby's presidential campaign heated up, she resigned from the board of Wal-Mart. Company officials said at the time that they weren't going to fill her vacancy. So what the hell was she doing on the Wal-Mart board? According to press accounts at the time, she was a show horse at the company's annual meetings when founder Sam Walton bused in cheering throngs to celebrate his non-union empire, which is headquartered in Arkansas, one of the country's poorest states. According to published reports, she was placed in charge of the company's "green" program to protect the environment. But nobody got greener than Sam Walton and his family. For several years in the '80s, he was judged the richest man in America by Forbes magazine; his fortune zoomed into the billions until he split it up among relatives. It's no surprise that Hillary is a strong supporter of free trade with China. Wal-Mart, despite its "Buy American" advertising campaign, is the single largest U.S. importer, and half of its imports come from China. Was Hillary the voice of conscience on the board for American and foreign workers? Contemporary accounts make no mention of that. They do describe her as a "corporate litigator" in those days, and they mention, speaking of environmental matters, that she also served on the board of Lafarge, a company that, according to a press account, once burned hazardous fuels to run its cement plants. Wal-Mart, though, was the crown jewel of Arkansas, the state's First Company fit for a first lady. During her tenure on the board, she presumably helped preside over the most remarkable growth of any company until Bill Gates came along. The number of Wal-Mart employees grew during the '80s from 21,600 to 279,000, while sales soared from $1.2 billion to $25.8 billion. And the Clintons depended on Wal-Mart's largesse not only for Hillary's regular payments as a board member but for travel expenses on Wal-Mart planes and for heavy campaign contributions to Bill's campaigns there and nationally. According to reports in the early '90s, before Bill and Hillary moved to D.C., neither was raking in the big bucks, but prominent in their income were her holdings of between $50,000 and $100,000 worth of Wal-Mart stock. A press report on the Clintons' finances during the early stages of Bill's 1992 run for the presidency showed that most of their income came from her $109,719 annual salary from the Rose Law Firm and tens of thousands of dollars in fees she received from serving on corporate boards. (She was on two others besides Wal-Mart's.) Her honoraria and director fees grew almost as fast as Wal-Mart's profits during the '80s—rising from $111 in 1980 to $6500 in 1986 to $64,700 in 1991, according to the same source. During the same period, small towns all over America began complaining that Wal-Mart was squeezing out ma-and-pa stores and leaving little burgs throughout the Midwest and South with downtowns that featured little more than empty storefronts. But selected small companies were doing quite well, thanks to the Clintons' friendship with Wal-Mart. The Boston Globe reported in January 1992 that Bill Clinton had introduced a brush company's executives to Wal-Mart executives, hoping that the two could do bidness. Executives of the brush company had been rebuffed in previous attempts to sell their products to Wal-Mart. Lucky for the company, it happened to be located in New Hampshire, where Clinton was trying to win a presidential primary. At the time, Hillary Clinton was still on Wal-Mart's board, and the retail giant was still resisting the unionization of any of its workers. Last week, Hillary was wearing a different hat. She stood in solidarity with the elderly Teamsters as Local 237 president Carl Haynes greeted her warmly, endorsed her, and then left early on what other union officials described as "AFL-CIO business." But the AFL-CIO was thinking of other business only a few months earlier when the union's leaders, including its chief, John Sweeney, marched specifically against Wal-Mart's oppression of its meat-market workers. According to a Web site run by activists at the AFL-CIO affiliate United Food and Commercial Workers, Wal-Mart "has profited by pushing its workers to the bottom of the wage scale." The union points out that hourly wages "average $2 to $3 per hour less than at unionized supermarkets." More grave for workers everywhere in the United States are these figures spouted by union activists: Wal-Mart is the largest private employer in the country, "yet fewer than 40 percent of its workers are covered by the company's health plan." The union notes that Wal-Mart's "hometown" judge in Arkansas issued a nationwide temporary restraining order against the UFCW, barring anyone associated with the union from entering Wal-Mart facilities to educate workers about their legal rights in the workplace. The union, however, successfully appealed the order—noting that the judge holds more than $500,000 in Wal-Mart stock. The case remains in litigation. Meanwhile, Wal-Mart's first lady, who also benefited from Wal-Mart stock, solicits support from union workers. Which makes her words to the elderly Teamsters last week especially poignant: "You can count on me to stand up for the right to collectively bargain!" Right on, sister! http://www.villagevoice.com/news/0021,harkavy,15052,5.html Laura, you are right but, question .... a conspiracy committed by who?

What do you think of the 1000 characters limit? Global impact McDonald's has become emblematic of globalization, sometimes referred as the "McDonaldization" of society. The Economist magazine uses the "Big Mac Index": the comparison of a Big Mac's cost in various world currencies can be used to informally judge these currencies' purchasing power parity. Because McDonald's is closely identified with American culture and lifestyle, its international business expansion has been termed[by who?] part of Americanization and American cultural imperialism. McDonald's is a perpetual target of various and often conflicting anti-globalization protests worldwide. The brand is known informally as "Mickey D's" (in the US and Canada), "Macky D's" (in the UK), "McDo" (in France, Quebec, the Philippines, and the Kansai region of Japan), "Maccer's" (in Ireland), "Maccas" (in New Zealand and Australia) or "de Mac" (in the Netherlands). Thomas Friedman once said that no country with a McDonald's had gone to war with another.[8] However, the "Golden Arches Theory of Conflict Prevention" is not strictly true. Careful historians point to the 1989 United States invasion of Panama, when NATO bombed Serbia in 1999, and the 2006 Lebanon War as exceptions. Some observers have suggested that the company should be given credit for increasing the standard of service in markets that it enters. A group of anthropologists in a study entitled Golden Arches East (Stanford University Press, 1998, edited by James L. Watson) looked at the impact McDonald's had on East Asia, and Hong Kong in particular. When it opened in Hong Kong in 1975, McDonald's was the first restaurant to consistently offer clean restrooms, driving customers to demand the same of other restaurants and institutions. In East Asia in particular, McDonald's have become a symbol for the desire to embrace Western cultural norms. McDonald's have recently taken to partnering up with Sinopec, China's second largest oil company, in the People's Republic of China, as it begins to take advantage of China's growing use of personal vehicles by opening numerous drive-thru restaurants. [9] In addition to its effect on business standards, McDonald's has also been instrumental in changing local customs. By popularizing the idea of a quick restaurant meal, Watson's study suggests, McDonald's led to the easing or elimination of various taboos, such as eating while walking in Japan.[dubious – discuss] CriticismPotted plants at a McDonald's. The company has been a target of criticism practically since its inception. Since the mid-1990s this protest has taken the form of an anti-globalization movement as documented in Naomi Klein's manifesto No Logo. McDonald's restaurants have been the targets of protests, peaceful and otherwise, by environmental, anti-globalization and animal rights activists. The company has used a litigious approach to protecting its business interests. This conflict, and the company's approach to resolving it, was epitomized in the early 1990s by what came to be known as the McLibel case. Two British activists, David Morris and Helen Steel, distributed leaflets entitled What's wrong with McDonald's? on the streets of London. McDonald's wrote to Steel and Morris demanding they desist and apologize, and, when they refused, sued them for libel. The trial lasted more than two years. The company's advertising techniques and business practices were scrutinized in the High Court of Justice in London and reported extensively in the press, who saw the case as a David and Goliath battle (under UK law, legal aid could not be granted for a defamation suit, so Steel and Morris did most of their own legal casework while McDonald's was represented by an extensive legal team). In June 1997, the judge ruled in favor of McDonald's, awarding the company £60,000 damages, which was later reduced to £40,000 by the Court of Appeal. The amount was low because the judge ruled that some of the claims made by Morris and Steel had been proved, including that McDonald's exploited children in its advertising, was anti-trade union and indirectly exploited and caused suffering to animals. Steel and Morris announced they had no intention of ever paying, and the company later confirmed it would not be pursuing the money. Steel and Morris later successfully challenged UK libel law in the European Court, arguing that it was an infringement of the right to free speech. The British Government was forced to re-write the legislation as a result. In 2005, a film by Ken Loach was made about the court case. In 2001, Eric Schlosser's book Fast Food Nation included criticism of McDonald's' business practices. Among the critiques are allegations that McDonald's (along with other companies within the fast-food industry) uses its political influence to increase their own profits at the expense of people's health and the social conditions of its workers. The book also brings into question McDonald's advertisement techniques where it targets children. While the book does mention other fast-food chains, it focuses primarily on McDonald's. In 2002, vegetarian groups, largely Hindu, successfully sued McDonald's for misrepresenting their French fries as vegetarian.[10] Even after the discontinuation of frying the French fries in beef tallow in 1990, the French fries still had beef extract added to them. The French fries sold in the U.S. still contain beef and animal flavoring. McDonald's biscuits also contain beef flavoring along with animal flavoring. Also in 2004, Morgan Spurlock's documentary film Super Size Me said that McDonald's food was contributing to the epidemic of obesity in society, and failing to provide nutritional information about its food for its customers. For 30 days Spurlock ate nothing but McDonald's (supersizing whenever asked). He ate everything on the menu at least once and continued to eat after he was full. At the same time he consciously attempted to get little or no exercise. By the end of the month he had gained 24.5 pounds (11.11 kg), was moody and had less interest in sex. Others have disputed Spurlock's claims (see below). After the film was shown at the Sundance Film Festival, but before its cinematic release, McDonald's stated it was phasing out its Supersize meal option and would begin offering several healthier menu items, though no link to the film was cited in this decision. However, while the healthier menu items have appeared, the Supersize meal option still remains available at some locations. The company also began a practice of putting nutritional information for all menu items in light grey small print on the reverse of their tray liners. It is currently phasing in nutritional labeling in clear black print on the actual packaging of its food items. Anthony Bourdain on his show, No Reservations, has criticised McDonald's among other fast-food restaurants for its culinary blandness. Legal challenge over trans fats In September 2002, McDonald’s announced it was voluntarily reducing the trans fat content of its cooking oil by February 2003. Because of operational problems, the oil was not changed on time. In the ensuing lawsuits, plaintiffs claimed that McDonald’s didn't do enough to inform the public that the oil was not changed. The bantransfat.com website contains testimonials from people, one claims she thought the oil was low in trans fat, and she said, "that is why I have been eating there every week..." In a settlement agreement, bantransfat.com said "While there is a difference of opinion regarding whether McDonald’s gave effective notice to its customers that the oil was not changed, McDonald’s deserves recognition and credit for having achieved a reduction in the trans fat levels ... and for working diligently over the last two years to test additional cooking oils." Nevertheless, bantransfat.com demanded monetary damages. Settlement of the lawsuit brought by BanTransFats.com and one private party requires McDonald’s spend up to $1.5 million to publish notices on the status of its trans fat initiative. McDonald’s will also donate $7 million to the American Heart Association for public education about trans fat. [3]. The settlement also requires some money be paid directly to bantransfat.com. The California Superior Court for Marin County has entered an order preliminarily approving the settlement. Supporters of McDonald's point out that the company is successful because it meets the needs of customers and adapts to its customers wants. In response to public pressure, McDonald's has sought to include more healthy choices in its menu and has introduced a new slogan to its recruitment posters: "Not bad for a McJob". (The word McJob, first attested in the mid-1980s[11] and later popularized by Canadian novelist Douglas Coupland in his book Generation X, has become a buzz word for low-paid, unskilled work with few prospects or benefits and little security.) McDonald's disputes the idea that its restaurant jobs have no prospects, noting that its CEO, Jim Skinner, started working at the company as a regular restaurant employee, and that 20 of its top 50 managers began work as regular crew members. [12] In 2007, the company launched an advertising campaign with the slogan "Would you like a career with that?" on Irish television, outlining that their jobs have many prospects. In a bid to tap into growing consumer interest in the provenance of food, the fast-food chain recently switched its supply of both coffee beans and milk. UK chief executive Steve Easterbrook said: “British consumers are increasingly interested in the quality, sourcing and ethics of the food and drink they buy". McDonald's coffee is now brewed from beans taken from stocks that have been certified by the conservation group the Rainforest Alliance. Similarly, milk supplies used for its hot drinks and milkshakes have been switched to organic sources which could account for 5% of the UK's organic milk output[13]. In other cases, the firm has shown itself ready to adjust its business practices. When the public became concerned that product packaging was environmentally damaging, McDonald's started a joint project with Friends of the Earth to eliminate the use of polystyrene containers, only in the United States, and to reduce the amount of waste produced. Throughout the McLibel trial, senior representatives of the firm said they were merely trying to protect its image from undue and unfounded attack. With regard to its numerous and often controversial copyright and trademark actions, McDonald's lawyers say they are simply protecting the company's intellectual property. Super Size Me has been characterized as a non-scientific publicity stunt. The subject of the film consumes massive quantities of McDonald's food, to the point of being sickened by it. Eating on an hourly schedule and, as part of his rules, eating additional quantities each time a McDonald's worker says the word "supersize," the subject gains weight. Following the release of the film Super Size Me, some people reported they had experienced no weight gain and suffered no ill effect by eating only at McDonald's for a month, but choosing menu items more judiciously and exercising frequently.Minimize Me Merab Morgan, a North Carolina woman, was even able to lose weight.Woman loses 33 lb on McDonald's diet She claimed that the transparency of nutritional information made it easy to control her daily caloric intake. Global impact McDonald's has become emblematic of globalization, sometimes referred as the "McDonaldization" of society. The Economist magazine uses the "Big Mac Index": the comparison of a Big Mac's cost in various world currencies can be used to informally judge these currencies' purchasing power parity. Because McDonald's is closely identified with American culture and lifestyle, its international business expansion has been termed[by who?] part of Americanization and American cultural imperialism. McDonald's is a perpetual target of various and often conflicting anti-globalization protests worldwide. The brand is known informally as "Mickey D's" (in the US and Canada), "Macky D's" (in the UK), "McDo" (in France, Quebec, the Philippines, and the Kansai region of Japan), "Maccer's" (in Ireland), "Maccas" (in New Zealand and Australia) or "de Mac" (in the Netherlands). Thomas Friedman once said that no country with a McDonald's had gone to war with another.[8] However, the "Golden Arches Theory of Conflict Prevention" is not strictly true. Careful historians point to the 1989 United States invasion of Panama, when NATO bombed Serbia in 1999, and the 2006 Lebanon War as exceptions. Some observers have suggested that the company should be given credit for increasing the standard of service in markets that it enters. A group of anthropologists in a study entitled Golden Arches East (Stanford University Press, 1998, edited by James L. Watson) looked at the impact McDonald's had on East Asia, and Hong Kong in particular. When it opened in Hong Kong in 1975, McDonald's was the first restaurant to consistently offer clean restrooms, driving customers to demand the same of other restaurants and institutions. In East Asia in particular, McDonald's have become a symbol for the desire to embrace Western cultural norms. McDonald's have recently taken to partnering up with Sinopec, China's second largest oil company, in the People's Republic of China, as it begins to take advantage of China's growing use of personal vehicles by opening numerous drive-thru restaurants. [9] In addition to its effect on business standards, McDonald's has also been instrumental in changing local customs. By popularizing the idea of a quick restaurant meal, Watson's study suggests, McDonald's led to the easing or elimination of various taboos, such as eating while walking in Japan.[dubious – discuss] CriticismPotted plants at a McDonald's. The company has been a target of criticism practically since its inception. Since the mid-1990s this protest has taken the form of an anti-globalization movement as documented in Naomi Klein's manifesto No Logo. McDonald's restaurants have been the targets of protests, peaceful and otherwise, by environmental, anti-globalization and animal rights activists. The company has used a litigious approach to protecting its business interests. This conflict, and the company's approach to resolving it, was epitomized in the early 1990s by what came to be known as the McLibel case. Two British activists, David Morris and Helen Steel, distributed leaflets entitled What's wrong with McDonald's? on the streets of London. McDonald's wrote to Steel and Morris demanding they desist and apologize, and, when they refused, sued them for libel. The trial lasted more than two years. The company's advertising techniques and business practices were scrutinized in the High Court of Justice in London and reported extensively in the press, who saw the case as a David and Goliath battle (under UK law, legal aid could not be granted for a defamation suit, so Steel and Morris did most of their own legal casework while McDonald's was represented by an extensive legal team). In June 1997, the judge ruled in favor of McDonald's, awarding the company £60,000 damages, which was later reduced to £40,000 by the Court of Appeal. The amount was low because the judge ruled that some of the claims made by Morris and Steel had been proved, including that McDonald's exploited children in its advertising, was anti-trade union and indirectly exploited and caused suffering to animals. Steel and Morris announced they had no intention of ever paying, and the company later confirmed it would not be pursuing the money. Steel and Morris later successfully challenged UK libel law in the European Court, arguing that it was an infringement of the right to free speech. The British Government was forced to re-write the legislation as a result. In 2005, a film by Ken Loach was made about the court case. In 2001, Eric Schlosser's book Fast Food Nation included criticism of McDonald's' business practices. Among the critiques are allegations that McDonald's (along with other companies within the fast-food industry) uses its political influence to increase their own profits at the expense of people's health and the social conditions of its workers. The book also brings into question McDonald's advertisement techniques where it targets children. While the book does mention other fast-food chains, it focuses primarily on McDonald's. In 2002, vegetarian groups, largely Hindu, successfully sued McDonald's for misrepresenting their French fries as vegetarian.[10] Even after the discontinuation of frying the French fries in beef tallow in 1990, the French fries still had beef extract added to them. The French fries sold in the U.S. still contain beef and animal flavoring. McDonald's biscuits also contain beef flavoring along with animal flavoring. Also in 2004, Morgan Spurlock's documentary film Super Size Me said that McDonald's food was contributing to the epidemic of obesity in society, and failing to provide nutritional information about its food for its customers. For 30 days Spurlock ate nothing but McDonald's (supersizing whenever asked). He ate everything on the menu at least once and continued to eat after he was full. At the same time he consciously attempted to get little or no exercise. By the end of the month he had gained 24.5 pounds (11.11 kg), was moody and had less interest in sex. Others have disputed Spurlock's claims (see below). After the film was shown at the Sundance Film Festival, but before its cinematic release, McDonald's stated it was phasing out its Supersize meal option and would begin offering several healthier menu items, though no link to the film was cited in this decision. However, while the healthier menu items have appeared, the Supersize meal option still remains available at some locations. The company also began a practice of putting nutritional information for all menu items in light grey small print on the reverse of their tray liners. It is currently phasing in nutritional labeling in clear black print on the actual packaging of its food items. Anthony Bourdain on his show, No Reservations, has criticised McDonald's among other fast-food restaurants for its culinary blandness. Legal challenge over trans fats In September 2002, McDonald’s announced it was voluntarily reducing the trans fat content of its cooking oil by February 2003. Because of operational problems, the oil was not changed on time. In the ensuing lawsuits, plaintiffs claimed that McDonald’s didn't do enough to inform the public that the oil was not changed. The bantransfat.com website contains testimonials from people, one claims she thought the oil was low in trans fat, and she said, "that is why I have been eating there every week..." In a settlement agreement, bantransfat.com said "While there is a difference of opinion regarding whether McDonald’s gave effective notice to its customers that the oil was not changed, McDonald’s deserves recognition and credit for having achieved a reduction in the trans fat levels ... and for working diligently over the last two years to test additional cooking oils." Nevertheless, bantransfat.com demanded monetary damages. Settlement of the lawsuit brought by BanTransFats.com and one private party requires McDonald’s spend up to $1.5 million to publish notices on the status of its trans fat initiative. McDonald’s will also donate $7 million to the American Heart Association for public education about trans fat. [3]. The settlement also requires some money be paid directly to bantransfat.com. The California Superior Court for Marin County has entered an order preliminarily approving the settlement. Supporters of McDonald's point out that the company is successful because it meets the needs of customers and adapts to its customers wants. In response to public pressure, McDonald's has sought to include more healthy choices in its menu and has introduced a new slogan to its recruitment posters: "Not bad for a McJob". (The word McJob, first attested in the mid-1980s[11] and later popularized by Canadian novelist Douglas Coupland in his book Generation X, has become a buzz word for low-paid, unskilled work with few prospects or benefits and little security.) McDonald's disputes the idea that its restaurant jobs have no prospects, noting that its CEO, Jim Skinner, started working at the company as a regular restaurant employee, and that 20 of its top 50 managers began work as regular crew members. [12] In 2007, the company launched an advertising campaign with the slogan "Would you like a career with that?" on Irish television, outlining that their jobs have many prospects. In a bid to tap into growing consumer interest in the provenance of food, the fast-food chain recently switched its supply of both coffee beans and milk. UK chief executive Steve Easterbrook said: “British consumers are increasingly interested in the quality, sourcing and ethics of the food and drink they buy". McDonald's coffee is now brewed from beans taken from stocks that have been certified by the conservation group the Rainforest Alliance. Similarly, milk supplies used for its hot drinks and milkshakes have been switched to organic sources which could account for 5% of the UK's organic milk output[13]. In other cases, the firm has shown itself ready to adjust its business practices. When the public became concerned that product packaging was environmentally damaging, McDonald's started a joint project with Friends of the Earth to eliminate the use of polystyrene containers, only in the United States, and to reduce the amount of waste produced. Throughout the McLibel trial, senior representatives of the firm said they were merely trying to protect its image from undue and unfounded attack. With regard to its numerous and often controversial copyright and trademark actions, McDonald's lawyers say they are simply protecting the company's intellectual property. Super Size Me has been characterized as a non-scientific publicity stunt. The subject of the film consumes massive quantities of McDonald's food, to the point of being sickened by it. Eating on an hourly schedule and, as part of his rules, eating additional quantities each time a McDonald's worker says the word "supersize," the subject gains weight. Following the release of the film Super Size Me, some people reported they had experienced no weight gain and suffered no ill effect by eating only at McDonald's for a month, but choosing menu items more judiciously and exercising frequently.Minimize Me Merab Morgan, a North Carolina woman, was even able to lose weight.Woman loses 33 lb on McDonald's diet She claimed that the transparency of nutritional information made it easy to control her daily caloric intake. Global impact McDonald's has become emblematic of globalization, sometimes referred as the "McDonaldization" of society. The Economist magazine uses the "Big Mac Index": the comparison of a Big Mac's cost in various world currencies can be used to informally judge these currencies' purchasing power parity. Because McDonald's is closely identified with American culture and lifestyle, its international business expansion has been termed[by who?] part of Americanization and American cultural imperialism. McDonald's is a perpetual target of various and often conflicting anti-globalization protests worldwide. The brand is known informally as "Mickey D's" (in the US and Canada), "Macky D's" (in the UK), "McDo" (in France, Quebec, the Philippines, and the Kansai region of Japan), "Maccer's" (in Ireland), "Maccas" (in New Zealand and Australia) or "de Mac" (in the Netherlands). Thomas Friedman once said that no country with a McDonald's had gone to war with another.[8] However, the "Golden Arches Theory of Conflict Prevention" is not strictly true. Careful historians point to the 1989 United States invasion of Panama, when NATO bombed Serbia in 1999, and the 2006 Lebanon War as exceptions. Some observers have suggested that the company should be given credit for increasing the standard of service in markets that it enters. A group of anthropologists in a study entitled Golden Arches East (Stanford University Press, 1998, edited by James L. Watson) looked at the impact McDonald's had on East Asia, and Hong Kong in particular. When it opened in Hong Kong in 1975, McDonald's was the first restaurant to consistently offer clean restrooms, driving customers to demand the same of other restaurants and institutions. In East Asia in particular, McDonald's have become a symbol for the desire to embrace Western cultural norms. McDonald's have recently taken to partnering up with Sinopec, China's second largest oil company, in the People's Republic of China, as it begins to take advantage of China's growing use of personal vehicles by opening numerous drive-thru restaurants. [9] In addition to its effect on business standards, McDonald's has also been instrumental in changing local customs. By popularizing the idea of a quick restaurant meal, Watson's study suggests, McDonald's led to the easing or elimination of various taboos, such as eating while walking in Japan.[dubious – discuss] CriticismPotted plants at a McDonald's. The company has been a target of criticism practically since its inception. Since the mid-1990s this protest has taken the form of an anti-globalization movement as documented in Naomi Klein's manifesto No Logo. McDonald's restaurants have been the targets of protests, peaceful and otherwise, by environmental, anti-globalization and animal rights activists. The company has used a litigious approach to protecting its business interests. This conflict, and the company's approach to resolving it, was epitomized in the early 1990s by what came to be known as the McLibel case. Two British activists, David Morris and Helen Steel, distributed leaflets entitled What's wrong with McDonald's? on the streets of London. McDonald's wrote to Steel and Morris demanding they desist and apologize, and, when they refused, sued them for libel. The trial lasted more than two years. The company's advertising techniques and business practices were scrutinized in the High Court of Justice in London and reported extensively in the press, who saw the case as a David and Goliath battle (under UK law, legal aid could not be granted for a defamation suit, so Steel and Morris did most of their own legal casework while McDonald's was represented by an extensive legal team). In June 1997, the judge ruled in favor of McDonald's, awarding the company £60,000 damages, which was later reduced to £40,000 by the Court of Appeal. The amount was low because the judge ruled that some of the claims made by Morris and Steel had been proved, including that McDonald's exploited children in its advertising, was anti-trade union and indirectly exploited and caused suffering to animals. Steel and Morris announced they had no intention of ever paying, and the company later confirmed it would not be pursuing the money. Steel and Morris later successfully challenged UK libel law in the European Court, arguing that it was an infringement of the right to free speech. The British Government was forced to re-write the legislation as a result. In 2005, a film by Ken Loach was made about the court case. In 2001, Eric Schlosser's book Fast Food Nation included criticism of McDonald's' business practices. Among the critiques are allegations that McDonald's (along with other companies within the fast-food industry) uses its political influence to increase their own profits at the expense of people's health and the social conditions of its workers. The book also brings into question McDonald's advertisement techniques where it targets children. While the book does mention other fast-food chains, it focuses primarily on McDonald's. In 2002, vegetarian groups, largely Hindu, successfully sued McDonald's for misrepresenting their French fries as vegetarian.[10] Even after the discontinuation of frying the French fries in beef tallow in 1990, the French fries still had beef extract added to them. The French fries sold in the U.S. still contain beef and animal flavoring. McDonald's biscuits also contain beef flavoring along with animal flavoring. Also in 2004, Morgan Spurlock's documentary film Super Size Me said that McDonald's food was contributing to the epidemic of obesity in society, and failing to provide nutritional information about its food for its customers. For 30 days Spurlock ate nothing but McDonald's (supersizing whenever asked). He ate everything on the menu at least once and continued to eat after he was full. At the same time he consciously attempted to get little or no exercise. By the end of the month he had gained 24.5 pounds (11.11 kg), was moody and had less interest in sex. Others have disputed Spurlock's claims (see below). After the film was shown at the Sundance Film Festival, but before its cinematic release, McDonald's stated it was phasing out its Supersize meal option and would begin offering several healthier menu items, though no link to the film was cited in this decision. However, while the healthier menu items have appeared, the Supersize meal option still remains available at some locations. The company also began a practice of putting nutritional information for all menu items in light grey small print on the reverse of their tray liners. It is currently phasing in nutritional labeling in clear black print on the actual packaging of its food items. Anthony Bourdain on his show, No Reservations, has criticised McDonald's among other fast-food restaurants for its culinary blandness. Legal challenge over trans fats In September 2002, McDonald’s announced it was voluntarily reducing the trans fat content of its cooking oil by February 2003. Because of operational problems, the oil was not changed on time. In the ensuing lawsuits, plaintiffs claimed that McDonald’s didn't do enough to inform the public that the oil was not changed. The bantransfat.com website contains testimonials from people, one claims she thought the oil was low in trans fat, and she said, "that is why I have been eating there every week..." In a settlement agreement, bantransfat.com said "While there is a difference of opinion regarding whether McDonald’s gave effective notice to its customers that the oil was not changed, McDonald’s deserves recognition and credit for having achieved a reduction in the trans fat levels ... and for working diligently over the last two years to test additional cooking oils." Nevertheless, bantransfat.com demanded monetary damages. Settlement of the lawsuit brought by BanTransFats.com and one private party requires McDonald’s spend up to $1.5 million to publish notices on the status of its trans fat initiative. McDonald’s will also donate $7 million to the American Heart Association for public education about trans fat. [3]. The settlement also requires some money be paid directly to bantransfat.com. The California Superior Court for Marin County has entered an order preliminarily approving the settlement. Supporters of McDonald's point out that the company is successful because it meets the needs of customers and adapts to its customers wants. In response to public pressure, McDonald's has sought to include more healthy choices in its menu and has introduced a new slogan to its recruitment posters: "Not bad for a McJob". (The word McJob, first attested in the mid-1980s[11] and later popularized by Canadian novelist Douglas Coupland in his book Generation X, has become a buzz word for low-paid, unskilled work with few prospects or benefits and little security.) McDonald's disputes the idea that its restaurant jobs have no prospects, noting that its CEO, Jim Skinner, started working at the company as a regular restaurant employee, and that 20 of its top 50 managers began work as regular crew members. [12] In 2007, the company launched an advertising campaign with the slogan "Would you like a career with that?" on Irish television, outlining that their jobs have many prospects. In a bid to tap into growing consumer interest in the provenance of food, the fast-food chain recently switched its supply of both coffee beans and milk. UK chief executive Steve Easterbrook said: “British consumers are increasingly interested in the quality, sourcing and ethics of the food and drink they buy". McDonald's coffee is now brewed from beans taken from stocks that have been certified by the conservation group the Rainforest Alliance. Similarly, milk supplies used for its hot drinks and milkshakes have been switched to organic sources which could account for 5% of the UK's organic milk output[13]. In other cases, the firm has shown itself ready to adjust its business practices. When the public became concerned that product packaging was environmentally damaging, McDonald's started a joint project with Friends of the Earth to eliminate the use of polystyrene containers, only in the United States, and to reduce the amount of waste produced. Throughout the McLibel trial, senior representatives of the firm said they were merely trying to protect its image from undue and unfounded attack. With regard to its numerous and often controversial copyright and trademark actions, McDonald's lawyers say they are simply protecting the company's intellectual property. Super Size Me has been characterized as a non-scientific publicity stunt. The subject of the film consumes massive quantities of McDonald's food, to the point of being sickened by it. Eating on an hourly schedule and, as part of his rules, eating additional quantities each time a McDonald's worker says the word "supersize," the subject gains weight. Following the release of the film Super Size Me, some people reported they had experienced no weight gain and suffered no ill effect by eating only at McDonald's for a month, but choosing menu items more judiciously and exercising frequently.Minimize Me Merab Morgan, a North Carolina woman, was even able to lose weight.Woman loses 33 lb on McDonald's diet She claimed that the transparency of nutritional information made it easy to control her daily caloric intake. Global impact McDonald's has become emblematic of globalization, sometimes referred as the "McDonaldization" of society. The Economist magazine uses the "Big Mac Index": the comparison of a Big Mac's cost in various world currencies can be used to informally judge these currencies' purchasing power parity. Because McDonald's is closely identified with American culture and lifestyle, its international business expansion has been termed[by who?] part of Americanization and American cultural imperialism. McDonald's is a perpetual target of various and often conflicting anti-globalization protests worldwide. The brand is known informally as "Mickey D's" (in the US and Canada), "Macky D's" (in the UK), "McDo" (in France, Quebec, the Philippines, and the Kansai region of Japan), "Maccer's" (in Ireland), "Maccas" (in New Zealand and Australia) or "de Mac" (in the Netherlands). Thomas Friedman once said that no country with a McDonald's had gone to war with another.[8] However, the "Golden Arches Theory of Conflict Prevention" is not strictly true. Careful historians point to the 1989 United States invasion of Panama, when NATO bombed Serbia in 1999, and the 2006 Lebanon War as exceptions. Some observers have suggested that the company should be given credit for increasing the standard of service in markets that it enters. A group of anthropologists in a study entitled Golden Arches East (Stanford University Press, 1998, edited by James L. Watson) looked at the impact McDonald's had on East Asia, and Hong Kong in particular. When it opened in Hong Kong in 1975, McDonald's was the first restaurant to consistently offer clean restrooms, driving customers to demand the same of other restaurants and institutions. In East Asia in particular, McDonald's have become a symbol for the desire to embrace Western cultural norms. McDonald's have recently taken to partnering up with Sinopec, China's second largest oil company, in the People's Republic of China, as it begins to take advantage of China's growing use of personal vehicles by opening numerous drive-thru restaurants. [9] In addition to its effect on business standards, McDonald's has also been instrumental in changing local customs. By popularizing the idea of a quick restaurant meal, Watson's study suggests, McDonald's led to the easing or elimination of various taboos, such as eating while walking in Japan.[dubious – discuss] CriticismPotted plants at a McDonald's. The company has been a target of criticism practically since its inception. Since the mid-1990s this protest has taken the form of an anti-globalization movement as documented in Naomi Klein's manifesto No Logo. McDonald's restaurants have been the targets of protests, peaceful and otherwise, by environmental, anti-globalization and animal rights activists. The company has used a litigious approach to protecting its business interests. This conflict, and the company's approach to resolving it, was epitomized in the early 1990s by what came to be known as the McLibel case. Two British activists, David Morris and Helen Steel, distributed leaflets entitled What's wrong with McDonald's? on the streets of London. McDonald's wrote to Steel and Morris demanding they desist and apologize, and, when they refused, sued them for libel. The trial lasted more than two years. The company's advertising techniques and business practices were scrutinized in the High Court of Justice in London and reported extensively in the press, who saw the case as a David and Goliath battle (under UK law, legal aid could not be granted for a defamation suit, so Steel and Morris did most of their own legal casework while McDonald's was represented by an extensive legal team). In June 1997, the judge ruled in favor of McDonald's, awarding the company £60,000 damages, which was later reduced to £40,000 by the Court of Appeal. The amount was low because the judge ruled that some of the claims made by Morris and Steel had been proved, including that McDonald's exploited children in its advertising, was anti-trade union and indirectly exploited and caused suffering to animals. Steel and Morris announced they had no intention of ever paying, and the company later confirmed it would not be pursuing the money. Steel and Morris later successfully challenged UK libel law in the European Court, arguing that it was an infringement of the right to free speech. The British Government was forced to re-write the legislation as a result. In 2005, a film by Ken Loach was made about the court case. In 2001, Eric Schlosser's book Fast Food Nation included criticism of McDonald's' business practices. Among the critiques are allegations that McDonald's (along with other companies within the fast-food industry) uses its political influence to increase their own profits at the expense of people's health and the social conditions of its workers. The book also brings into question McDonald's advertisement techniques where it targets children. While the book does mention other fast-food chains, it focuses primarily on McDonald's. In 2002, vegetarian groups, largely Hindu, successfully sued McDonald's for misrepresenting their French fries as vegetarian.[10] Even after the discontinuation of frying the French fries in beef tallow in 1990, the French fries still had beef extract added to them. The French fries sold in the U.S. still contain beef and animal flavoring. McDonald's biscuits also contain beef flavoring along with animal flavoring. Also in 2004, Morgan Spurlock's documentary film Super Size Me said that McDonald's food was contributing to the epidemic of obesity in society, and failing to provide nutritional information about its food for its customers. For 30 days Spurlock ate nothing but McDonald's (supersizing whenever asked). He ate everything on the menu at least once and continued to eat after he was full. At the same time he consciously attempted to get little or no exercise. By the end of the month he had gained 24.5 pounds (11.11 kg), was moody and had less interest in sex. Others have disputed Spurlock's claims (see below). After the film was shown at the Sundance Film Festival, but before its cinematic release, McDonald's stated it was phasing out its Supersize meal option and would begin offering several healthier menu items, though no link to the film was cited in this decision. However, while the healthier menu items have appeared, the Supersize meal option still remains available at some locations. The company also began a practice of putting nutritional information for all menu items in light grey small print on the reverse of their tray liners. It is currently phasing in nutritional labeling in clear black print on the actual packaging of its food items. Anthony Bourdain on his show, No Reservations, has criticised McDonald's among other fast-food restaurants for its culinary blandness. Legal challenge over trans fats In September 2002, McDonald’s announced it was voluntarily reducing the trans fat content of its cooking oil by February 2003. Because of operational problems, the oil was not changed on time. In the ensuing lawsuits, plaintiffs claimed that McDonald’s didn't do enough to inform the public that the oil was not changed. The bantransfat.com website contains testimonials from people, one claims she thought the oil was low in trans fat, and she said, "that is why I have been eating there every week..." In a settlement agreement, bantransfat.com said "While there is a difference of opinion regarding whether McDonald’s gave effective notice to its customers that the oil was not changed, McDonald’s deserves recognition and credit for having achieved a reduction in the trans fat levels ... and for working diligently over the last two years to test additional cooking oils." Nevertheless, bantransfat.com demanded monetary damages. Settlement of the lawsuit brought by BanTransFats.com and one private party requires McDonald’s spend up to $1.5 million to publish notices on the status of its trans fat initiative. McDonald’s will also donate $7 million to the American Heart Association for public education about trans fat. [3]. The settlement also requires some money be paid directly to bantransfat.com. The California Superior Court for Marin County has entered an order preliminarily approving the settlement. Supporters of McDonald's point out that the company is successful because it meets the needs of customers and adapts to its customers wants. In response to public pressure, McDonald's has sought to include more healthy choices in its menu and has introduced a new slogan to its recruitment posters: "Not bad for a McJob". (The word McJob, first attested in the mid-1980s[11] and later popularized by Canadian novelist Douglas Coupland in his book Generation X, has become a buzz word for low-paid, unskilled work with few prospects or benefits and little security.) McDonald's disputes the idea that its restaurant jobs have no prospects, noting that its CEO, Jim Skinner, started working at the company as a regular restaurant employee, and that 20 of its top 50 managers began work as regular crew members. [12] In 2007, the company launched an advertising campaign with the slogan "Would you like a career with that?" on Irish television, outlining that their jobs have many prospects. In a bid to tap into growing consumer interest in the provenance of food, the fast-food chain recently switched its supply of both coffee beans and milk. UK chief executive Steve Easterbrook said: “British consumers are increasingly interested in the quality, sourcing and ethics of the food and drink they buy". McDonald's coffee is now brewed from beans taken from stocks that have been certified by the conservation group the Rainforest Alliance. Similarly, milk supplies used for its hot drinks and milkshakes have been switched to organic sources which could account for 5% of the UK's organic milk output[13]. In other cases, the firm has shown itself ready to adjust its business practices. When the public became concerned that product packaging was environmentally damaging, McDonald's started a joint project with Friends of the Earth to eliminate the use of polystyrene containers, only in the United States, and to reduce the amount of waste produced. Throughout the McLibel trial, senior representatives of the firm said they were merely trying to protect its image from undue and unfounded attack. With regard to its numerous and often controversial copyright and trademark actions, McDonald's lawyers say they are simply protecting the company's intellectual property. Super Size Me has been characterized as a non-scientific publicity stunt. The subject of the film consumes massive quantities of McDonald's food, to the point of being sickened by it. Eating on an hourly schedule and, as part of his rules, eating additional quantities each time a McDonald's worker says the word "supersize," the subject gains weight. Following the release of the film Super Size Me, some people reported they had experienced no weight gain and suffered no ill effect by eating only at McDonald's for a month, but choosing menu items more judiciously and exercising frequently.Minimize Me Merab Morgan, a North Carolina woman, was even able to lose weight.Woman loses 33 lb on McDonald's diet She claimed that the transparency of nutritional information made it easy to control her daily caloric intake. Global impact McDonald's has become emblematic of globalization, sometimes referred as the "McDonaldization" of society. The Economist magazine uses the "Big Mac Index": the comparison of a Big Mac's cost in various world currencies can be used to informally judge these currencies' purchasing power parity. Because McDonald's is closely identified with American culture and lifestyle, its international business expansion has been termed[by who?] part of Americanization and American cultural imperialism. McDonald's is a perpetual target of various and often conflicting anti-globalization protests worldwide. The brand is known informally as "Mickey D's" (in the US and Canada), "Macky D's" (in the UK), "McDo" (in France, Quebec, the Philippines, and the Kansai region of Japan), "Maccer's" (in Ireland), "Maccas" (in New Zealand and Australia) or "de Mac" (in the Netherlands). Thomas Friedman once said that no country with a McDonald's had gone to war with another.[8] However, the "Golden Arches Theory of Conflict Prevention" is not strictly true. Careful historians point to the 1989 United States invasion of Panama, when NATO bombed Serbia in 1999, and the 2006 Lebanon War as exceptions. Some observers have suggested that the company should be given credit for increasing the standard of service in markets that it enters. A group of anthropologists in a study entitled Golden Arches East (Stanford University Press, 1998, edited by James L. Watson) looked at the impact McDonald's had on East Asia, and Hong Kong in particular. When it opened in Hong Kong in 1975, McDonald's was the first restaurant to consistently offer clean restrooms, driving customers to demand the same of other restaurants and institutions. In East Asia in particular, McDonald's have become a symbol for the desire to embrace Western cultural norms. McDonald's have recently taken to partnering up with Sinopec, China's second largest oil company, in the People's Republic of China, as it begins to take advantage of China's growing use of personal vehicles by opening numerous drive-thru restaurants. [9] In addition to its effect on business standards, McDonald's has also been instrumental in changing local customs. By popularizing the idea of a quick restaurant meal, Watson's study suggests, McDonald's led to the easing or elimination of various taboos, such as eating while walking in Japan.[dubious – discuss] CriticismPotted plants at a McDonald's. The company has been a target of criticism practically since its inception. Since the mid-1990s this protest has taken the form of an anti-globalization movement as documented in Naomi Klein's manifesto No Logo. McDonald's restaurants have been the targets of protests, peaceful and otherwise, by environmental, anti-globalization and animal rights activists. The company has used a litigious approach to protecting its business interests. This conflict, and the company's approach to resolving it, was epitomized in the early 1990s by what came to be known as the McLibel case. Two British activists, David Morris and Helen Steel, distributed leaflets entitled What's wrong with McDonald's? on the streets of London. McDonald's wrote to Steel and Morris demanding they desist and apologize, and, when they refused, sued them for libel. The trial lasted more than two years. The company's advertising techniques and business practices were scrutinized in the High Court of Justice in London and reported extensively in the press, who saw the case as a David and Goliath battle (under UK law, legal aid could not be granted for a defamation suit, so Steel and Morris did most of their own legal casework while McDonald's was represented by an extensive legal team). In June 1997, the judge ruled in favor of McDonald's, awarding the company £60,000 damages, which was later reduced to £40,000 by the Court of Appeal. The amount was low because the judge ruled that some of the claims made by Morris and Steel had been proved, including that McDonald's exploited children in its advertising, was anti-trade union and indirectly exploited and caused suffering to animals. Steel and Morris announced they had no intention of ever paying, and the company later confirmed it would not be pursuing the money. Steel and Morris later successfully challenged UK libel law in the European Court, arguing that it was an infringement of the right to free speech. The British Government was forced to re-write the legislation as a result. In 2005, a film by Ken Loach was made about the court case. In 2001, Eric Schlosser's book Fast Food Nation included criticism of McDonald's' business practices. Among the critiques are allegations that McDonald's (along with other companies within the fast-food industry) uses its political influence to increase their own profits at the expense of people's health and the social conditions of its workers. The book also brings into question McDonald's advertisement techniques where it targets children. While the book does mention other fast-food chains, it focuses primarily on McDonald's. In 2002, vegetarian groups, largely Hindu, successfully sued McDonald's for misrepresenting their French fries as vegetarian.[10] Even after the discontinuation of frying the French fries in beef tallow in 1990, the French fries still had beef extract added to them. The French fries sold in the U.S. still contain beef and animal flavoring. McDonald's biscuits also contain beef flavoring along with animal flavoring. Also in 2004, Morgan Spurlock's documentary film Super Size Me said that McDonald's food was contributing to the epidemic of obesity in society, and failing to provide nutritional information about its food for its customers. For 30 days Spurlock ate nothing but McDonald's (supersizing whenever asked). He ate everything on the menu at least once and continued to eat after he was full. At the same time he consciously attempted to get little or no exercise. By the end of the month he had gained 24.5 pounds (11.11 kg), was moody and had less interest in sex. Others have disputed Spurlock's claims (see below). After the film was shown at the Sundance Film Festival, but before its cinematic release, McDonald's stated it was phasing out its Supersize meal option and would begin offering several healthier menu items, though no link to the film was cited in this decision. However, while the healthier menu items have appeared, the Supersize meal option still remains available at some locations. The company also began a practice of putting nutritional information for all menu items in light grey small print on the reverse of their tray liners. It is currently phasing in nutritional labeling in clear black print on the actual packaging of its food items. Anthony Bourdain on his show, No Reservations, has criticised McDonald's among other fast-food restaurants for its culinary blandness. Legal challenge over trans fats In September 2002, McDonald’s announced it was voluntarily reducing the trans fat content of its cooking oil by February 2003. Because of operational problems, the oil was not changed on time. In the ensuing lawsuits, plaintiffs claimed that McDonald’s didn't do enough to inform the public that the oil was not changed. The bantransfat.com website contains testimonials from people, one claims she thought the oil was low in trans fat, and she said, "that is why I have been eating there every week..." In a settlement agreement, bantransfat.com said "While there is a difference of opinion regarding whether McDonald’s gave effective notice to its customers that the oil was not changed, McDonald’s deserves recognition and credit for having achieved a reduction in the trans fat levels ... and for working diligently over the last two years to test additional cooking oils." Nevertheless, bantransfat.com demanded monetary damages. Settlement of the lawsuit brought by BanTransFats.com and one private party requires McDonald’s spend up to $1.5 million to publish notices on the status of its trans fat initiative. McDonald’s will also donate $7 million to the American Heart Association for public education about trans fat. [3]. The settlement also requires some money be paid directly to bantransfat.com. The California Superior Court for Marin County has entered an order preliminarily approving the settlement. Supporters of McDonald's point out that the company is successful because it meets the needs of customers and adapts to its customers wants. In response to public pressure, McDonald's has sought to include more healthy choices in its menu and has introduced a new slogan to its recruitment posters: "Not bad for a McJob". (The word McJob, first attested in the mid-1980s[11] and later popularized by Canadian novelist Douglas Coupland in his book Generation X, has become a buzz word for low-paid, unskilled work with few prospects or benefits and little security.) McDonald's disputes the idea that its restaurant jobs have no prospects, noting that its CEO, Jim Skinner, started working at the company as a regular restaurant employee, and that 20 of its top 50 managers began work as regular crew members. [12] In 2007, the company launched an advertising campaign with the slogan "Would you like a career with that?" on Irish television, outlining that their jobs have many prospects. In a bid to tap into growing consumer interest in the provenance of food, the fast-food chain recently switched its supply of both coffee beans and milk. UK chief executive Steve Easterbrook said: “British consumers are increasingly interested in the quality, sourcing and ethics of the food and drink they buy". McDonald's coffee is now brewed from beans taken from stocks that have been certified by the conservation group the Rainforest Alliance. Similarly, milk supplies used for its hot drinks and milkshakes have been switched to organic sources which could account for 5% of the UK's organic milk output[13]. In other cases, the firm has shown itself ready to adjust its business practices. When the public became concerned that product packaging was environmentally damaging, McDonald's started a joint project with Friends of the Earth to eliminate the use of polystyrene containers, only in the United States, and to reduce the amount of waste produced. Throughout the McLibel trial, senior representatives of the firm said they were merely trying to protect its image from undue and unfounded attack. With regard to its numerous and often controversial copyright and trademark actions, McDonald's lawyers say they are simply protecting the company's intellectual property. Super Size Me has been characterized as a non-scientific publicity stunt. The subject of the film consumes massive quantities of McDonald's food, to the point of being sickened by it. Eating on an hourly schedule and, as part of his rules, eating additional quantities each time a McDonald's worker says the word "supersize," the subject gains weight. Following the release of the film Super Size Me, some people reported they had experienced no weight gain and suffered no ill effect by eating only at McDonald's for a month, but choosing menu items more judiciously and exercising frequently.Minimize Me Merab Morgan, a North Carolina woman, was even able to lose weight.Woman loses 33 lb on McDonald's diet She claimed that the transparency of nutritional information made it easy to control her daily caloric intake.

help i have no idea wat this means some body explain in short text 10 points best answer in plain explantion? Overview Instant messaging (IM) and chat are technologies that facilitate near real-time text based communication between two or more participants over a network. It is important to understand that what separates chat and instant messaging from technologies such as e-mail is the perceived synchronicity of the communication by the user - Chat happens in real-time before your eyes. For this reason, some people consider communication via instant messaging to be less intrusive than communication via phone. However, some systems allow the sending of messages to people not currently logged on (offline messages), thus removing much of the difference between Instant Messaging and e-mail. Instant Messaging allows instantaneous communication between a number of parties simultaneously, by transmitting information quickly. Some IM systems allow users to use webcams and Microphone which made them more popular than others. Due to this feature users can have a real-time conversation. In addition IM has additional features such as: the immediate receipt of acknowledgment or reply, group chatting, conference services (including voice and video), conversation logging and file transfer. IM allows effective and efficient communication, featuring immediate receipt of acknowledgment or reply. In certain cases Instant Messaging involves additional features, which make it even more popular, i.e. to see the other party, e.g. by using web-cams, or to talk directly for free over the Internet. It is possible to save a conversation for later reference. Instant messages are typically logged in a local message history which closes the gap to the persistent nature of e-mails and facilitates quick exchange of information like URLs or document snippets (which can be unwieldy when communicated via telephone). [edit] History In early instant messaging programs each character appeared when it was typed. The UNIX "talk" command shown in these screenshots was popular in the 1980s and early 1990s.Instant messaging actually predates the Internet, first appearing on multi-user operating systems like CTSS and Multics[1] in the mid-1960s. Initially, many of these systems, such as CTSS'.SAVED, were used as notification systems for services like printing, but quickly were used to facilitate communication with other users logged in to the same machine. As networks developed, the protocols spread with the networks. Some of these used a peer-to-peer protocol (eg talk, ntalk and ytalk), while others required peers to connect to a server (see talker and IRC). During the Bulletin board system (BBS) phenomenon that peaked during the 1980s, some systems incorporated chat features which were similar to instant messaging; Freelancin'_Roundtable was one prime example. In the last half of the 1980s and into the early 1990s, the Quantum Link online service for Commodore 64 computers offered user-to-user messages between currently connected customers which they called "On-Line Messages" (or OLM for short). Quantum Link's better known later incarnation, America Online, offers a similar product under the name "AOL Instant Messages" (AIM). While the Quantum Link service ran on a Commodore 64, using only the Commodore's PETSCII text-graphics, the screen was visually divided up into sections and OLMs would appear as a yellow bar saying "Message From:" and the name of the sender along with the message across the top of whatever the user was already doing, and presented a list of options for responding.[2] As such, it could be considered a sort of GUI, albeit much more primitive than the later Unix, Windows and Macintosh based GUI IM programs. OLMs were what Q-Link called "Plus Services" meaning they charged an extra per-minute fee on top of the monthly Q-Link access costs. Modern, Internet-wide, GUI-based messaging clients, as they are known today, began to take off in the mid 1990s with ICQ (1996) being the first, followed by AOL Instant Messenger (AOL Instant Messenger, 1997). AOL later acquired Mirabilis, the creators of ICQ. A few years later ICQ (by now owned by AOL) was awarded two patents for instant messaging by the U.S. patent office. Meanwhile, other companies developed their own applications (Excite, MSN, Ubique, and Yahoo), each with its own proprietary protocol and client; users therefore had to run multiple client applications if they wished to use more than one of these networks. In 1998 IBM released IBM Lotus Sametime, a product based on technology acquired when IBM bought Haifa-based Ubique and Lexington-based Databeam. In 2000, an open source application and open standards-based protocol called Jabber was launched. Jabber servers could act as gateways to other IM protocols, reducing the need to run multiple clients. Multi-protocol clients such as Digsby,Pidgin, Trillian, Adium and Miranda can use any of the popular IM protocols by using additional local libraries for each protocol. IBM Lotus Sametime's November 2007 release added IBM Lotus Sametime Gateway support for XMPP. Recently, many instant messaging services have begun to offer video conferencing features, Voice Over IP (VoIP) and web conferencing services. Web conferencing services integrate both video conferencing and instant messaging capabilities. Some newer instant messaging companies are offering desktop sharing, IP radio, and IPTV to the voice and video features. The term "instant messenger" is a service mark of Time Warner[3] and may not be used in software not affiliated with AOL in the United States. For this reason, the instant messaging client formerly known as Gaim or gaim announced in April 2007 that they would be renamed "Pidgin"[4]. [edit] Cooperation Standard free instant messaging applications offer functions like file transfer, contact lists, the ability to have similtaneous converstations etc. These may be all the functions that a small business needs but larger organisations will require more sophisticated applications that can work together. The solution to finding applications capable of this is to use enterprise versions of instant messaging applications. These include titles like Jabber, Lotus Sametime, Microsoft Office Communicator, etc., which are often integrated with other enterprise applications such as workflow systems. These enterprise applications, or Enterprise Application Integration (EAI), are built to certain constraints, namely storing data in a common format. There have been several attempts to create a unified standard for instant messaging: IETF's SIP (Session Initiation Protocol) and SIMPLE (SIP for Instant Messaging and Presence Leveraging Extensions), APEX (Application Exchange), Prim (Presence and Instant Messaging Protocol), the open XML-based XMPP (Extensible Messaging and Presence Protocol), more commonly known as Jabber and OMA's (Open Mobile Alliance) IMPS (Instant Messaging and Presence Service) created specifically for mobile devices. Most attempts at creating a unified standard for the major IM providers (AOL, Yahoo! and Microsoft) have failed and each continues to use its own proprietary protocol. However, while discussions at IETF were stalled, Reuters head of collaboration services, David Gurle (the founder of Microsoft's Real Time Communication and Collaboration business), signed the first inter-service provider connectivity agreement on September 2003. This agreement enabled AIM, ICQ and MSN Messenger users to talk with Reuters Messaging counterparts and vice-versa against an access fee. Following this, Microsoft, Yahoo! and AOL came to a deal where Microsoft's Live Communication Server 2005 users would also have the possibility to talk to public instant messaging users. This deal established SIP/SIMPLE as a standard for protocol interoperability and established a connectivity fee for accessing public instant messaging clouds. Separately, on October 13, 2005 Microsoft and Yahoo! announced that by (the Northern Hemisphere) summer of 2006 they would interoperate using SIP/SIMPLE which is followed on December 2005 by the AOL and Google strategic partnership deal where Google Talk users would be able to talk with AIM and ICQ users provided they have an identity at AOL. There are two ways to combine the many disparate protocols: One way is to combine the many disparate protocols inside the IM client application. The other way is to combine the many disparate protocols inside the IM server application. This approach moves the task of communicating to the other services to the server. Clients need not know or care about other IM protocols. For example, LCS 2005 Public IM Connectivity. This approach is popular in Jabber/XMPP servers however the so-called transport projects suffer the same reverse engineering difficulties as any other project involved with closed protocols or formats. Some approaches, such as that adopted by the Sonork enterprise IM software or the Jabber/XMPP network or Winpopup LAN Messenger, allow organizations to create their own private instant messaging network by enabling them to limit access to the server (often with the IM network entirely behind their firewall) and administer user permissions. Other corporate messaging systems allow registered users to also connect from outside the corporation LAN, by using a secure firewall-friendly HTTPS based protocol. Typically, a dedicated corporate IM server has several advantages such as pre-populated contact lists, integrated authentication, and better security and privacy. Some networks have made changes to prevent them from being utilized by such multi-network IM clients. For example, Trillian had to release several revisions and patches to allow its users to access the MSN, AOL, and Yahoo! networks, after changes were made to these networks. The major IM providers typically cite the need for formal agreements as well as security concerns as reasons for making these changes. [edit] Mobile Instant Messaging Mobile Instant Messaging (MIM) is a presence enabled messaging service that aims to transpose the desktop messaging experience to the usage scenario of being on the move. While several of the core ideas of the desktop experience on one hand apply to a connected mobile device, others do not: Users usually only look at their phone's screen — presence status changes might occur under different circumstances as happens at the desktop, and several functional limits exist based on the fact that the vast majority of mobile communication devices are chosen by their users to fit into the palm of their hand. Some of the form factor and mobility related differences need to be taken into account in order to create a really adequate, powerful and yet convenient mobile experience: radio bandwidth, memory size, availability of media formats, keypad based input, screen output, CPU performance and battery power are core issues that desktop device users and even nomadic users with connected network. [edit] Friend-to-friend networks Instant Messaging may be done in a Friend-to-friend network, in which each node connects to the friends on the friendslist. This allows for communication with friends of friends and for the building of chatrooms for instant messages with all friends on that network. Emotions are often expressed in shorthand. For example; lol. But a movement is currently underway to be more accurate with the emotional expression. Real time reactions such as (chortle) (snort) (guffaw) or (eye-roll) are rapidly taking the place of acronyms.[citation needed] [edit] Business application Instant messaging has proven to be similar to personal computers, e-mail, and the WWW, in that its adoption for use as a business communications medium was driven primarily by individual employees using consumer software at work, rather than by formal mandate or provisioning by corporate information technology departments. Tens of millions of the consumer IM accounts in use are being used for business purposes by employees of companies and other organizations. In response to the demand for business-grade IM and the need to ensure security and legal compliance, a new type of instant messaging, called "Enterprise Instant Messaging" ("EIM") was created when Lotus Software launched IBM Lotus Sametime in 1998. Microsoft followed suit shortly thereafter with Microsoft Exchange Instant Messaging, later created a new platform called Microsoft Office Live Communications Server, and released Office Communications Server 2007 in October 2007. Both IBM Lotus and Microsoft have introduced federation between their EIM systems and some of the public IM networks so that employees may use a single interface to both their internal EIM system and their contacts on AOL, MSN, and Yahoo!. Current leading EIM platforms include IBM Lotus Sametime, Microsoft Office Communications Server, and Jabber XCP. In addition, industry-focused EIM platforms such as IMtrader from Pivot Incorporated, Reuters Messaging, and Bloomberg Messaging provide enhanced IM capabilities to financial services companies. The adoption of IM across corporate networks outside of the control of IT organizations creates risks and liabilities for companies who do not effectively manage and support IM use. Companies implement specialized IM archiving and security products and services like those from Secure Computing, Akonix, SurfControl, and ScanSafe to mitigate these risks and provide safe, secure, productive instant messaging capabilities to their employees. [edit] Practical Use in Enterprise The popular embrace of IM technology for sharing information has quickly led to organizations adopting IM solutions for the perceived advantages that can be brought by it. As organizations are becoming more information based (McNurlin & Sprague, 2006, p.499) the need for effective knowledge sharing, team working and collaborative environments amongst employees has become vital, especially within more geographically dispersed teams. Typically IM conversations tend to have a certain "character", they are often short and only cover one topic. Media-switching and multitasking are common throughout, however IM might also be used between established coworkers and friends for longer, more intermittent conversation. In their report of IM use at the workplace Nardi et al. (2000) identifies the four primary functions of IM which are often cited in other reports, These primary functions are: Quick Questions and Clarifications Coordinating and scheduling tasks Coordinating impromptu social meetings Keeping in touch with friends and family IM is perhaps best suited to "Quick Questions and Clarifications" as this is the most often mentioned attribute in other reports. A user can "respond rapidly without the overhead of telephone or FTF interaction. For example, IDC reports, "Users see IM as a medium for quick, semi-permanent ‘flashes’ that beg a near-immediate response" (Isaacs et al., 2002). Nardi's second and third observations are enabled in part due to the "Presence Awareness" feature of IM clients in which the user knows who is "available". This is the most relevant for colleagues who share the same physical space as each other and even paves the way for other mediums to take up the task of communication e.g. F2F or Phone. The implication is that viable communication of any sort can in someway be encouraged through IM's "Presence Awareness" feature. (Issacs et al, 2002) supports this view, "IM in business might not be the main tool for of communication, it could just be the meeting point for another type of media e.g. conference calls. Nardi's third and fourth observations focus on the social use of IM, which have also been widely publicized in other report. That IM is used for keeping in touch with friends and arranging social events has led some employers to believe that it is used primarily for this purpose. According to (Issacs et al, 2002) a market study found that "'Fear of losing employee productivity’ was the greatest concern of businesses in regards to instant messaging". The study by (Issacs et al, 2002) goes on to suggest this fear is unfounded as it was found that on average "only 13% of conversations contained personal topics", and "only 6.4% were exclusively personal". [edit] Review of Products "IM solutions can typically be catagorised into two types: Enterprise Instant Messaging (EIM) and Consumer Instant Mesaging (CIM). Enterprise solutions use an internal IM server, however this isn't always feasible, particularly for smaller businesses with limited budgets. The second option, using a (CIM) provides the advantage of being inexpensive to implement and has little need for investing in new hardware or server software. However, in recent years open source IM clients such as Jabber have emerged that provide free EIM grade solutions. (Wikipedia,. 2008) For corporate use encryption and conversation archiving are usually regarded as important features due to security concerns. Sometimes the use of different operating systems in organizations calls for the use of software that supports more than one platform. For example many software companies use Windows XP in administration departments but have software developers who use Linux. Most people have had experience of using online chat and messaging over the internet whether it is with Microsoft's Windows Live Messenger, Skype or e-mail. One form of chat and messaging currently popular is Bebo. It is a non-corporate form of messaging which allows its user to create and maintain a social network. Libraries use chat applications and Morris Messenger is an application commonly used by them. This is a power based instant messenger, which uses Perl, SQL, and small Java. It accepts input from both staff and regular customers and saves important information in an SQL database built for the system. [edit] Risks and liabilities Although instant messaging delivers many benefits, it also carries with it certain risks and liabilities, particularly when used in workplaces. Among these risks and liabilities are: Security risks (e.g. IM used to infect computers with spyware, viruses, trojans, worms) Compliance risks Inappropriate use Intellectual property leakage Crackers (malicious "hacker" or black hat hacker) have consistently used IM networks as vectors for delivering phishing attempts, "poison URL's", and virus-laden file attachments from 2004 to the present, with over 1100 discrete attacks listed by the IM Security Center[5] in 2004-2007. Hackers use two methods of delivering malicious code through IM: delivery of virus, trojan, or spyware within an infected file, and the use of "socially engineered" text with a web address that entices the recipient to click on a URL that connects him or her to a website that then downloads malicious code. Viruses, worms, and trojans typically propagate by sending themselves rapidly through the infected user's buddy list. An effective attack using a poison URL may reach tens of thousands of people in minutes when each person's buddy list receives messages appearing to be from a trusted friend. The recipients click on the web address, and the entire cycle starts again. Infections may range from nuisance to criminal, and are becoming more sophisticated each year. In addition to the malicious code threat, the use of instant messaging at work also creates a risk of non-compliance to laws and regulations governing the use of electronic communications in businesses. In the United States alone there are over 10,000 laws and regulations related to electronic messaging and records retention.[6] The more well-known of these include the Sarbanes-Oxley Act, HIPAA, and SEC 17a-3. Clarification from the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority ("FINRA") was issued to member firms in the financial services industry in December, 2007, noting that "electronic communications", "email", and "electronic correspondence" may be used interchangeably and can include such forms of electronic messaging as instant messaging and text messaging.[7] Changes to Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, effective December 1, 2006, created a new category for electronic records which may be requested during discovery (law) in legal proceedings. Most countries around the world also regulate the use of electronic messaging and electronic records retention in similar fashion to the United States. The most common regulations related to IM at work involve the need to produce archived business communications to satisfy government or judicial requests under law. Many instant messaging communications fall into the category of business communications that must be archived and retrievable. Organizations of all types must protect themselves from the liability of their employees' inappropriate use of IM. The informal, immediate, and ostensibly anonymous nature of instant messaging makes it a candidate for abuse in the workplace. The topic of inappropriate IM use became front page news in October 2006 when Congressman Mark Foley resigned his seat after admitting sending offensive instant messages of a sexual nature to underage former House pages from his Congressional office PC. The Mark Foley Scandal led to media coverage and mainstream newspaper articles warning of the risks of inappropriate IM use in workplaces. In most countries, corporations have a legal responsibility to ensure harassment-free work environment for employees. The use of corporate-owned computers, networks, and software to harass an individual or spread inappropriate jokes or language creates a liability for not only the offender but also the employer. A survey by IM archiving and security provider Akonix Systems, Inc. in March 2007 showed that 31% of respondents had been harassed over IM at work.[8] Companies now include instant messaging as an integral component of their policies on appropriate use of the World Wide Web, e-mail, and other corporate assets. Within the company there is also the risk of employees using instant messaging to release confidential information and project details to an outside source. This issue is best controlled by a combination of written policy and technology. An organization's policies on use of IM in the workplace should be an integral part of the overall computing and network use policies, and should be published and communicated at least annually. In addition to written policy, organizations should implement "gateways" or IM security products to monitor content of inbound and outbound messages. Products from IM security providers (See section on IM security) typically allow administrators to set alerts and enforce policy (i.e. allow or block messages) based on keywords and regular expressions within instant messages. Employees may also misuse IM to communicate on a personal level with friends and family. This is poor use of a business’s time and resources, as the employee’s effectiveness will most certainly decrease due to the added distractions. (Licari, J., May 2005). Businesses often use IM security products to monitor and archive IM conversations for the purpose of minimizing this type of productivity drain. [edit] Security and archiving In the early 2000s, a new class of IT security provider emerged to provide remedies for the risks and liabilities faced by corporations who chose to use IM for business communications. The IM security providers created new products to be installed in corporate networks for the purpose of archiving, content-scanning, and security-scanning IM traffic moving in and out of the corporation. Similar to the e-mail filtering vendors, the IM security providers focus on the risks and liabilities described above. With rapid adoption of IM in the workplace, demand for IM security products began to grow in the mid-2000s. By 2007, the preferred platform for the purchase of security software had become the "appliance", according to IDC, who estimate that by 2008, 80% of network security products will be delivered via an appliance.[9] [edit] User base Note that many of the numbers listed in this section are not directly comparable, and some are speculative. Some instant messaging systems are distributed among many different instances and thus difficult to measure in total (e.g. Jabber). While some numbers are given by the owners of a complete instant messaging system, others are provided by commercial vendors of a part of a distributed system. Some companies may be motivated to inflate their numbers in order to increase advertisement earnings or to attract partners, clients, or customers. Importantly, some numbers are reported as the number of "active" users (without a shared standard of that activity), others indicate total user accounts, while others indicate only the users logged in during an instance of peak usage. Service User count Date/source AIM 53 million active September 2006 >100 million total January 2006 Jabber 40-50 million total January 2007, based on calculations of Jabber Inc 90 million total Based on calculations of Process-One: Process-One uses ejabberd as Jabber server software. If it is assumed that ejabberd has a 40% market share amongst public and private open source server deployments, there are 50 million users using open source servers. With Jabber Inc's numbers, this adds up to the 90 million number stated here. eBuddy 35 million total October 2006, including 4 million mobile users Windows Live Messenger 294 million active worldwide November 2007 Yahoo! Messenger 22 million total September 2006 QQ 20 million peak online (majority in China) 3 June 2006 221 million "active" (majority in China) 3 June 2006 IBM Lotus Sametime 17 million total (private, in enterprises) November 2007 ICQ 15 million active July 2006 Skype 12 million peak online February 2008 309 million total April 2008 Xfire 10 million total May 2008 MXit 7 million total (>560,000 outside of South Africa) 10 August 2007. Note that these users are part of the Jabber user base as MXit federates with the Jabber network. Gadu-Gadu 5.6 million total June 2006 Paltalk 3.3 million unique visitors per month August 2006 IMVU 1 million total June 2007 Mail.ru Agent 1 million active (daily) September 2006 Meebo 1 million total October 2006 PSYC 1 million active (daily) (majority in Brazil) February 2007. Total count cannot be accurately estimated due to the decentralized nature of the protocol. VZOchat >200,000 October 2007 [edit] IM Language Users sometimes make use of internet slang or text speak to abbreviate common words or expressions in order to quicken conversations or to reduce keystrokes. [edit] See also Comparison of instant messaging clients Comparison of instant messaging protocols Instant messaging manager LAN messenger Text messaging it is a question

How should true patriots reclaim the media from Republican/Fascist interests? http://www.nowfoundation.org/issues/communications/tv/mediacontrol.html http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&lr=&q=fascism+in+america&btnG=Search ) Powerful and Continuing Nationalism: Fascist regimes tend to make constant use of patriotic mottos, slogans, symbols, songs, and other paraphernalia. Flags are seen everywhere, as are flag symbols on clothing and in public displays. September 11 Freedom Walk New Majority Leader: Iraq War “May Be The Greatest Gift That We Give” Our Grandchildren Headstones of soldiers killed in Iraq and Afghanistan are inscribed with the Pentagons war-marketing slogans White House and the RNC are going to make a habit of using uniformed military personnel as props at Republican political rallies, despite the fact that it is a plain violation of military regulations banning politicization of the armed forces. "You must glorify war in order to get the public to accept the fact that your going to send their sons and daughters to die." The inside story of the cozy relationship between big box office American war movies and the Pentagon More... 2.) Disdain for the Recognition of Human Rights: Because of fear of enemies and the need for security, the people in fascist regimes are persuaded that human rights can be ignored in certain cases because of "need." The people tend to look the other way or even approve of torture, summary executions, assassinations, long incarcerations of prisoners, etc. Bush threatens to veto $442b defense bill if Congress investigates detainee abuses. Guantanamo Judge: “I don’t care about international law. I don’t want to hear the words ‘international law’ again. We are not concerned with international law.” Rumsfeld to approve new guidelines that will formalize the administration's policy of imprisoning without the protections of the Geneva Conventions and enable the Pentagon to legally hold "ghost detainees," US 'preparing to detain terror suspects for life without trial' U.S. oks evidence gained through torture July 1, 2003: U.S. Suspends Military Aid to Nearly 50 Countries: because they have supported the International Criminal Court and failed to exempt Americans from possible prosecution. US has at least 9000 prisoners in secret detention More... 3.) Identification of Enemies/Scapegoats as a Unifying Cause: The people are rallied into a unifying patriotic frenzy over the need to eliminate a perceived common threat or foe: racial, ethnic or religious minorities; liberals; communists; socialists, terrorists, etc. Congressman: Muslims 'enemy amongst us' SB 24, Ohio law to muzzle "liberals" World history textbook used by seventh-graders at Scottsdale’s Mohave Middle School was pulled from classrooms mid-semester amid growing right criticism of the book’s unbiased portrayal of Islam Rallies planned against 'Islamofacism': Event to 'unify all Americans behind common goal' More... 4.) Supremacy of the Military: Even when there are widespread domestic problems, the military is given a disproportionate amount of government funding, and the domestic agenda is neglected. Soldiers and military service are glamorized. If you haven't seen the Oreo flash animation yet, see it here Bush’s Domestic Program Hit List Bush slashes domestic programs, boosts defense. Arlen Spector calls it "scandalous" Funding for job training, rural health care, low-income schools and help for people lacking health insurance would face big cuts under a bill passed Friday by the House Pentagon to spend 75 billion for three new brigades Three cable channels now feed news, information and entertainment about the armed services into millions of living rooms 24 hours a day, seven days a week: The Military Channel, the Military History Channel and the Pentagon Channel. More... 5.) Rampant Sexism: The governments of fascist nations tend to be almost exclusively male-dominated. Under fascist regimes, traditional gender roles are made more rigid. Opposition to abortion is high, as is homophobia and anti-gay legislation and national policy. It's legal again, to fire gov't workers for being gay Bush calls for Constitutional ban on same-sex marriages Bush refuses to sign U.N proposal on women's "sexual" rights W. David Hager chairman of the FDA's Reproductive Health Drugs Advisory Committee does not prescribe contraceptives for single women, does not do abortions, will not prescribe RU-486 and will not insert IUDs. The State Department has awarded an explicitly anti-feminist U.S. group part of a US$10 million grant to train Iraqi women in political participation and democracy. More... 6.) Controlled Mass Media: Sometimes the media is directly controlled by the government, but in other cases, the media is indirectly controlled by government regulation, or sympathetic media spokespeople and executives. Censorship, especially in war time, is very common. FBI Acknowledges: Journalists Phone Records are Fair Game Report shows U.S. government has been engaged in illegal propaganda aimed at its own citizens and the story gets only 41 mentions in the media Free Press details recent governmental propaganda efforts, from faux-correspondent Jeff Gannon to paid-off pundit Armstrong Williams, and from the demise of FOIA to video news releases passed off as news. also... See a Whitehouse fake news release here (opens realplayer) US seizes webservers from independent media sites Bush's war on information: US editors forbidden to publish certain foreign writers More... 7.) Obsession with National Security: Fear is used as a motivational tool by the government over the masses Bush Aides ADMIT 'stoking fear' for political gain: Bush adviser said the president hopes to change the dynamics of the race. The strategy is aimed at stoking public fears about terrorism, raising new concerns about Kerry's ability to protect Americans and reinforcing Bush's image as the steady anti-terrorism candidate, aides said. The Bush administration periodically put the USA on high alert for terrorist attacks even though then-Homeland Security chief Tom Ridge argued there was only flimsy evidence to justify raising the threat level. Keith Olbermann: "The Nexus of Politics and Terror." Cheney warns that if Kerry is elected, the USA will suffer a "devastating attack" GOP convention in a nutshell (quicktime) Rove: GOP to Use Terror As Campaign Issue in 2006 More... 8.) Religion and Government are Intertwined: Governments in fascist nations tend to use the most common religion in the nation as a tool to manipulate public opinion. Religious rhetoric and terminology is common from government leaders, even when the major tenets of the religion are diametrically opposed to the government's policies or actions. Jerry Falwell cleared of charges that he broke federal election law by urging followers to vote for Bush NC congressman proposes law making it ok to preach politics from the pulpit Texas Governor Mobilizes Evangelicals Family research council: Justice Sunday Thou shalt be like Bush: What makes this recently established, right-wing Christian college unique are the increasingly close - critics say alarmingly close - links it has with the Bush administration and the Republican establishment. Park Service Continues to Push Creationist Theory at Grand Canyon and other nat'l parks More... 9.) Corporate Power is Protected: The industrial and business aristocracy of a fascist nation often are the ones who put the government leaders into power, creating a mutually beneficial business/government relationship and power elite. The K Street Project is a project by the Republican party to pressure Washington lobbying firms to hire Republicans in top positions, and to reward loyal GOP lobbyists with access to influential officials. It was launched in 1995, by Republican strategist Grover Norquist and House majority leader Tom DeLay. American Conservative Magazine: One U.S. contractor received $2 million in a duffel bag... and a U.S. official was given $7 million in cash in the waning days of the CPA and told to spend it “before the Iraqis take over.” There are 6 Congressional Committees investigating the Oil-for-Food (UN) scandal, yet not a single Republican Committee Chairman will call a hearing to investigate the whereabouts of 9 billion dollars missing in Iraq Bush money network rooted in Florida, Texas: Since Mr. Bush took office in 2001, the federal government has awarded more than $3 billion in contracts to the President's elite 2004 Texas fund-raisers, their businesses, and lobbying clients More... 10.) Labor Power is Suppressed: Because the organizing power of labor is the only real threat to a fascist government, labor unions are either eliminated entirely, or are severely suppressed. Labor Department warns unions against using their money politically President Bush Attacks Organized Labor: Bush attacked organized labor Saturday, issuing orders effectively reducing how much money unions can spend for political activities and opening up government contracts to non-union bidding. March 2001: President Bush signed his name to four executive orders on organized labor last month, including one that cuts the money unions will have for political campaign spending. Congress and the Department of Labor are trying to change the rules on overtime pay, eliminating the 40 hour work week, taking eligibility for overtime pay away from millions of workers, and replacing time and a half pay with comp days. More... 11.) Disdain for Intellectuals and the Arts: Fascist nations tend to promote and tolerate open hostility to higher education, and academia. It is not uncommon for professors and other academics to be censored or even arrested. Free expression in the arts is openly attacked, and governments often refuse to fund the arts. Bush's new economic plan cuts funding for arts, education Artists from all over the world are being refused entry to the US on security grounds. A group of more than 60 top U.S. scientists, including 20 Nobel laureates and several science advisers to past Republican presidents, on Wednesday accused the Bush administration of manipulating and censoring science for political purposes Freedom of Repression: New ruling will allow censorship of campus publications More... 12.) Obsession with Crime and Punishment: Under fascist regimes, the police are given almost limitless power to enforce laws. The people are often willing to overlook police abuses and even forego civil liberties in the name of patriotism. There is often a national police force with virtually unlimited power in fascist nations American Gestapo is here: "There is hereby created and established a permanent police force, to be known as the 'United States Secret Service Uniformed Division.'" America: secret jails, secret courts, secret arrests, and now secret laws Snitch-or-Go-to-Jail bill will make pretty much anything short of reporting on everyone you see for doing just about anything a jailable offense. With minimum sentences, up to and including life without parole. The problem with Gonzales is that he has been deeply involved in developing some of the most sweeping claims of near-dictatorial presidential power in our nation's history, allowing him to imprison and even (at least in theory) torture anyone in the world, at any time Police officers don't have to give a reason at the time they arrest someone, the U.S. Supreme Court said in a ruling that shields officers from false-arrest lawsuits. More... 13.) Rampant Cronyism and Corruption: Fascist regimes almost always are governed by groups of friends and associates who appoint each other to government positions and use governmental power and authority to protect their friends from accountability. It is not uncommon in fascist regimes for national resources and even treasures to be appropriated or even outright stolen by government leaders. Bush Cronyism: Foxes Guarding the henhouse Making Sense of the Abramoff Scandal If Bush's pick is confirmed, that will mean the five top appointees at Justice have zero prosecutorial experience among them. Iran-Contra Felons Get Good Jobs from Bush Big Iraq Reconstruction Contracts Went To Big Donors Bush Wars -- Crooks Get Contracts : The main companies that were awarded billions of dollars worth of contracts in Iraq have paid more than $300 million in fines since 2000, to resolve allegations of fraud, bid rigging, delivery of faulty military equipment, and environmental damage. US Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA) lost track of $9 billion "Contracting in the aftermath of the hurricanes has been marked by waste, corruption and cronyism" More... 14. Fraudulent Elections: Sometimes elections in fascist nations are a complete sham. Other times elections are manipulated by smear campaigns against or even assassination of opposition candidates, use of legislation to control voting numbers or political district boundaries, and manipulation of the media. Fascist nations also typically use their judiciaries to manipulate or control elections. Rolling Stone does some investigative and rather exhaustive digging into public documents and says we’re almost guaranteed the 2004 election results were massively rigged Powerful Government Accounting Office report confirms key 2004 stolen election findings Conyers hearing in which Clinton Curtis testifies that he was hired to create hackable voting machines (.wmv) The Republican Party has quietly paid hundreds of thousands of dollars to provide private defense lawyers for a former Bush campaign official charged with conspiring to keep Democrats from voting in New Hampshire. The Conyers Report (.pdf) No explanation for the machines in Mahoning County that recorded Kerry votes for Bush, the improper purging in Cuyahoga County, the lock down in Warren County, the 99% voter turnout in Miami County, the machine tampering in Hocking County Less access than Kazakhstan. Fewer fail-safes than Venezuela. Not as simple Republic of Georgia. The 2004 Elections according to international observers. This picture is what stopped the ballot recounts in Florida shortly after it seemed that legitimate President Gore had a lead. The "citizens" started what was later called "the preppy riot". Screaming, yelling, pounding on the walls, these "outraged citizens" intimidated the polling officials to halt the court mandated recount. A closer look reveals who they really were. They were bussed and flown in at Republican lawmakers expense. Some even flew in on Tom Delay's private plane. More... If Mussolini defines fascism as "the merger of corporate and government power" what does that make the K Street project? Related Articles: "Now and Then"- Part 1 A 3 part series by W David Jenkins III on the similarities between America now and Germany post Reichstag fire Click here to purchase this image on POAC merchandise "Now and Then"- Part II: The Propaganda Machine Now and Then- Part III Hitler's Playbook: Bush and the Abuse of Power It may sound crazy to some, but the style of governing into which America has slid is most accurately described as fascism. Is America Becoming Fascist? Eternal Fascism: Fourteen Ways of Looking at a Blackshirt The Danger of American Fascism: With a fascist the problem is never how best to present the truth to the public but how best to use the news to deceive the public into giving the fascist and his group more money or more power. Sheila Samples: Freedom To Fascism -- A Bumpy Ride: Republicans don't seem to realize that they are no longer individual members of a coherent "party," but are merely part of a mean-spirited and dangerous movement that is threatening to sweep away democracy as we know it. Germany In 1933: The Easy Slide Into Fascism The Brownshirting of America: Bush’s supporters demand lock-step consensus that Bush is right. They regard truthful reports that Saddam Hussein had no weapons of mass destruction and was not involved in the September 11 attack on the US – truths now firmly established by the Bush administration’s own reports – as treasonous America-bashing. Fascism then. Fascism now? When people think of fascism, they imagine Rows of goose-stepping storm troopers and puffy-chested dictators. What they don't see is the economic and political process that leads to the nightmare. What is Fascism? Some General Ideological Features Hello. You are now living in a fascist empire Neo-fascism in America : Too many people believe fascism is only about goose-stepping, jack-booted Nazis. Too many people believe that American democracy is so strong that fascists could never take control of America. If you are sympathetic to those views, I invite you to consider the possibility that you are mistaken. It is in times of fascism rising that armies of ignorance are once more resuscitated from the bowels of a society bordering on the edge of mass psychosis. The America at the dawn of the twenty-first century is no exception... Republican Party Brown Shirts: "The Wide-Awakes": The organization was known for virulent anti-Catholicism, secretive rituals, and a military-style organization complete with "officers" and units. Harper's Magazine: We Now Live in a Fascist State They Saw It Coming: The 19th-Century Libertarian Critique of Fascism Victims of Creeping Fascism: We are witnessing nothing less astonishing than the demise of the American experiment. 12-20 The ten phases of a Bush scandal. 12-22

How should true patriots combat the rising fascism in America? http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&lr=&q=fascism+in+america&btnG=Search http://207.44.245.159/article7553.htm http://www.oldamericancentury.org/14pts.htm 1.) Powerful and Continuing Nationalism: Fascist regimes tend to make constant use of patriotic mottos, slogans, symbols, songs, and other paraphernalia. Flags are seen everywhere, as are flag symbols on clothing and in public displays. September 11 Freedom Walk New Majority Leader: Iraq War “May Be The Greatest Gift That We Give” Our Grandchildren Headstones of soldiers killed in Iraq and Afghanistan are inscribed with the Pentagons war-marketing slogans White House and the RNC are going to make a habit of using uniformed military personnel as props at Republican political rallies, despite the fact that it is a plain violation of military regulations banning politicization of the armed forces. "You must glorify war in order to get the public to accept the fact that your going to send their sons and daughters to die." The inside story of the cozy relationship between big box office American war movies and the Pentagon More... 2.) Disdain for the Recognition of Human Rights: Because of fear of enemies and the need for security, the people in fascist regimes are persuaded that human rights can be ignored in certain cases because of "need." The people tend to look the other way or even approve of torture, summary executions, assassinations, long incarcerations of prisoners, etc. Bush threatens to veto $442b defense bill if Congress investigates detainee abuses. Guantanamo Judge: “I don’t care about international law. I don’t want to hear the words ‘international law’ again. We are not concerned with international law.” Rumsfeld to approve new guidelines that will formalize the administration's policy of imprisoning without the protections of the Geneva Conventions and enable the Pentagon to legally hold "ghost detainees," US 'preparing to detain terror suspects for life without trial' U.S. oks evidence gained through torture July 1, 2003: U.S. Suspends Military Aid to Nearly 50 Countries: because they have supported the International Criminal Court and failed to exempt Americans from possible prosecution. US has at least 9000 prisoners in secret detention More... 3.) Identification of Enemies/Scapegoats as a Unifying Cause: The people are rallied into a unifying patriotic frenzy over the need to eliminate a perceived common threat or foe: racial, ethnic or religious minorities; liberals; communists; socialists, terrorists, etc. Congressman: Muslims 'enemy amongst us' SB 24, Ohio law to muzzle "liberals" World history textbook used by seventh-graders at Scottsdale’s Mohave Middle School was pulled from classrooms mid-semester amid growing right criticism of the book’s unbiased portrayal of Islam Rallies planned against 'Islamofacism': Event to 'unify all Americans behind common goal' More... 4.) Supremacy of the Military: Even when there are widespread domestic problems, the military is given a disproportionate amount of government funding, and the domestic agenda is neglected. Soldiers and military service are glamorized. If you haven't seen the Oreo flash animation yet, see it here Bush’s Domestic Program Hit List Bush slashes domestic programs, boosts defense. Arlen Spector calls it "scandalous" Funding for job training, rural health care, low-income schools and help for people lacking health insurance would face big cuts under a bill passed Friday by the House Pentagon to spend 75 billion for three new brigades Three cable channels now feed news, information and entertainment about the armed services into millions of living rooms 24 hours a day, seven days a week: The Military Channel, the Military History Channel and the Pentagon Channel. More... 5.) Rampant Sexism: The governments of fascist nations tend to be almost exclusively male-dominated. Under fascist regimes, traditional gender roles are made more rigid. Opposition to abortion is high, as is homophobia and anti-gay legislation and national policy. It's legal again, to fire gov't workers for being gay Bush calls for Constitutional ban on same-sex marriages Bush refuses to sign U.N proposal on women's "sexual" rights W. David Hager chairman of the FDA's Reproductive Health Drugs Advisory Committee does not prescribe contraceptives for single women, does not do abortions, will not prescribe RU-486 and will not insert IUDs. The State Department has awarded an explicitly anti-feminist U.S. group part of a US$10 million grant to train Iraqi women in political participation and democracy. More... 6.) Controlled Mass Media: Sometimes the media is directly controlled by the government, but in other cases, the media is indirectly controlled by government regulation, or sympathetic media spokespeople and executives. Censorship, especially in war time, is very common. FBI Acknowledges: Journalists Phone Records are Fair Game Report shows U.S. government has been engaged in illegal propaganda aimed at its own citizens and the story gets only 41 mentions in the media Free Press details recent governmental propaganda efforts, from faux-correspondent Jeff Gannon to paid-off pundit Armstrong Williams, and from the demise of FOIA to video news releases passed off as news. also... See a Whitehouse fake news release here (opens realplayer) US seizes webservers from independent media sites Bush's war on information: US editors forbidden to publish certain foreign writers More... 7.) Obsession with National Security: Fear is used as a motivational tool by the government over the masses Bush Aides ADMIT 'stoking fear' for political gain: Bush adviser said the president hopes to change the dynamics of the race. The strategy is aimed at stoking public fears about terrorism, raising new concerns about Kerry's ability to protect Americans and reinforcing Bush's image as the steady anti-terrorism candidate, aides said. The Bush administration periodically put the USA on high alert for terrorist attacks even though then-Homeland Security chief Tom Ridge argued there was only flimsy evidence to justify raising the threat level. Keith Olbermann: "The Nexus of Politics and Terror." Cheney warns that if Kerry is elected, the USA will suffer a "devastating attack" GOP convention in a nutshell (quicktime) Rove: GOP to Use Terror As Campaign Issue in 2006 More... 8.) Religion and Government are Intertwined: Governments in fascist nations tend to use the most common religion in the nation as a tool to manipulate public opinion. Religious rhetoric and terminology is common from government leaders, even when the major tenets of the religion are diametrically opposed to the government's policies or actions. Jerry Falwell cleared of charges that he broke federal election law by urging followers to vote for Bush NC congressman proposes law making it ok to preach politics from the pulpit Texas Governor Mobilizes Evangelicals Family research council: Justice Sunday Thou shalt be like Bush: What makes this recently established, right-wing Christian college unique are the increasingly close - critics say alarmingly close - links it has with the Bush administration and the Republican establishment. Park Service Continues to Push Creationist Theory at Grand Canyon and other nat'l parks More... 9.) Corporate Power is Protected: The industrial and business aristocracy of a fascist nation often are the ones who put the government leaders into power, creating a mutually beneficial business/government relationship and power elite. The K Street Project is a project by the Republican party to pressure Washington lobbying firms to hire Republicans in top positions, and to reward loyal GOP lobbyists with access to influential officials. It was launched in 1995, by Republican strategist Grover Norquist and House majority leader Tom DeLay. American Conservative Magazine: One U.S. contractor received $2 million in a duffel bag... and a U.S. official was given $7 million in cash in the waning days of the CPA and told to spend it “before the Iraqis take over.” There are 6 Congressional Committees investigating the Oil-for-Food (UN) scandal, yet not a single Republican Committee Chairman will call a hearing to investigate the whereabouts of 9 billion dollars missing in Iraq Bush money network rooted in Florida, Texas: Since Mr. Bush took office in 2001, the federal government has awarded more than $3 billion in contracts to the President's elite 2004 Texas fund-raisers, their businesses, and lobbying clients More... 10.) Labor Power is Suppressed: Because the organizing power of labor is the only real threat to a fascist government, labor unions are either eliminated entirely, or are severely suppressed. Labor Department warns unions against using their money politically President Bush Attacks Organized Labor: Bush attacked organized labor Saturday, issuing orders effectively reducing how much money unions can spend for political activities and opening up government contracts to non-union bidding. March 2001: President Bush signed his name to four executive orders on organized labor last month, including one that cuts the money unions will have for political campaign spending. Congress and the Department of Labor are trying to change the rules on overtime pay, eliminating the 40 hour work week, taking eligibility for overtime pay away from millions of workers, and replacing time and a half pay with comp days. More... 11.) Disdain for Intellectuals and the Arts: Fascist nations tend to promote and tolerate open hostility to higher education, and academia. It is not uncommon for professors and other academics to be censored or even arrested. Free expression in the arts is openly attacked, and governments often refuse to fund the arts. Bush's new economic plan cuts funding for arts, education Artists from all over the world are being refused entry to the US on security grounds. A group of more than 60 top U.S. scientists, including 20 Nobel laureates and several science advisers to past Republican presidents, on Wednesday accused the Bush administration of manipulating and censoring science for political purposes Freedom of Repression: New ruling will allow censorship of campus publications More... 12.) Obsession with Crime and Punishment: Under fascist regimes, the police are given almost limitless power to enforce laws. The people are often willing to overlook police abuses and even forego civil liberties in the name of patriotism. There is often a national police force with virtually unlimited power in fascist nations American Gestapo is here: "There is hereby created and established a permanent police force, to be known as the 'United States Secret Service Uniformed Division.'" America: secret jails, secret courts, secret arrests, and now secret laws Snitch-or-Go-to-Jail bill will make pretty much anything short of reporting on everyone you see for doing just about anything a jailable offense. With minimum sentences, up to and including life without parole. The problem with Gonzales is that he has been deeply involved in developing some of the most sweeping claims of near-dictatorial presidential power in our nation's history, allowing him to imprison and even (at least in theory) torture anyone in the world, at any time Police officers don't have to give a reason at the time they arrest someone, the U.S. Supreme Court said in a ruling that shields officers from false-arrest lawsuits. More... 13.) Rampant Cronyism and Corruption: Fascist regimes almost always are governed by groups of friends and associates who appoint each other to government positions and use governmental power and authority to protect their friends from accountability. It is not uncommon in fascist regimes for national resources and even treasures to be appropriated or even outright stolen by government leaders. Bush Cronyism: Foxes Guarding the henhouse Making Sense of the Abramoff Scandal If Bush's pick is confirmed, that will mean the five top appointees at Justice have zero prosecutorial experience among them. Iran-Contra Felons Get Good Jobs from Bush Big Iraq Reconstruction Contracts Went To Big Donors Bush Wars -- Crooks Get Contracts : The main companies that were awarded billions of dollars worth of contracts in Iraq have paid more than $300 million in fines since 2000, to resolve allegations of fraud, bid rigging, delivery of faulty military equipment, and environmental damage. US Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA) lost track of $9 billion "Contracting in the aftermath of the hurricanes has been marked by waste, corruption and cronyism" More... 14. Fraudulent Elections: Sometimes elections in fascist nations are a complete sham. Other times elections are manipulated by smear campaigns against or even assassination of opposition candidates, use of legislation to control voting numbers or political district boundaries, and manipulation of the media. Fascist nations also typically use their judiciaries to manipulate or control elections. Rolling Stone does some investigative and rather exhaustive digging into public documents and says we’re almost guaranteed the 2004 election results were massively rigged Powerful Government Accounting Office report confirms key 2004 stolen election findings Conyers hearing in which Clinton Curtis testifies that he was hired to create hackable voting machines (.wmv) The Republican Party has quietly paid hundreds of thousands of dollars to provide private defense lawyers for a former Bush campaign official charged with conspiring to keep Democrats from voting in New Hampshire. The Conyers Report (.pdf) No explanation for the machines in Mahoning County that recorded Kerry votes for Bush, the improper purging in Cuyahoga County, the lock down in Warren County, the 99% voter turnout in Miami County, the machine tampering in Hocking County Less access than Kazakhstan. Fewer fail-safes than Venezuela. Not as simple Republic of Georgia. The 2004 Elections according to international observers. This picture is what stopped the ballot recounts in Florida shortly after it seemed that legitimate President Gore had a lead. The "citizens" started what was later called "the preppy riot". Screaming, yelling, pounding on the walls, these "outraged citizens" intimidated the polling officials to halt the court mandated recount. A closer look reveals who they really were. They were bussed and flown in at Republican lawmakers expense. Some even flew in on Tom Delay's private plane.

We recently bought a house and broke our Ohio Apt. lease. What are my rights? I am a firm believer in rules and laws and therefore realize that in most cases, when I sign a contract I'm bound to it. In this case my wife and I moved into an apartment community knowing we would be looking for a house and disclosed this to the property manager. We had been in the apartment for 6 months and then found a house. The property manager (apartment community) is making us give 60 days notice and revert back from the 1 year promotional rate they gave us at move in time to full market price for those 60 days. In addition we must pay a break lease fee of 1.5x our monthly rent (market rate) and pay back the promotional discount we recieved during our 6 months renting. Here are my issues that I'm unclear about. 1. While I realize it is our responsibility to read through the lease, when your handed a 20 page, small print lease agreement with tons of legalese and they stand over you until you sign it, it's difficult to read through all that timely and understand it. That's why they offered to walk us through it and explain each section. As they did this they failed to explain that they had two seperate break lease policies. One policy was in effect for the first year of residency, the second applied to any residency beyond a year. During the first year they hit you harder if you break the lease. They failed to tell us this and never indicated (until we gave notice) that the break lease policy was different the first year. During their explanation of the break lease policy at our lease signing, they described the policy for residency after the first year without specifying this. This however is verbal discussion and the contract does state it clearly. My issue with it is that we were mislead on this point - most likely on purpose. 2. I've lived in 8 apartments in 5 states and have never even heard of 60 day notice when breaking the lease. It's always been 30 days. Is 60 days notice legal? How can they require 60 day notice and be earnestly looking to re-rent an apartment? They're just making me pay more instead of trying to re-rent the apartment. I happen to know that within our 60 days they rented numerous apartments on the property. Do I have any rights here? 3. I'm assuming it is, but can they legally require me to pay back 6 months of the 1 year promotional discount that they gave us when we moved in? 4. Our promotional rate was basically $100 off each month for a year. However we were paying $100 more each month than the same apartment anywhere else on the property because of it's unique location - it overlooked a small lake and two fountains. Since we've lived here the two fountains have not worked properly and the past two months only one has worked. We've put in dozens of maintenance requests to have them fixed but they still have not been fixed. If we are paying extra for this unique view and the fountains aren't working, do we have any rights there? When I look at this objectively I can see that what property manager is asking is not too off the wall. However I've had one lawyer and two Real Estate agents as well as countless friends tell me to look into this because it doesn't sound right and at least in the case of the 1st year break lease policy, we were mislead. Any thoughts or advice on this would be great.

Who still believes Global Warming is caused by man? Global warming ethics, pork and profits By Paul Driessen web posted February 12, 2007 The ink has barely dried on its new code of conduct, and already Congress is redefining ethics and pork to fit a global warming agenda. As Will Rogers observed, "with Congress, every time they make a joke, it's a law. And every time they make a law, it's a joke." However, life-altering, economy-wrecking climate bills are no laughing matter. That's why we need to recognize that the Kyoto Protocol and proposed "climate protection" laws will not stabilize the climate, even if CO2 is to blame. It's why we must acknowledge that money to be made, and power to be gained, from climate alarmism and symbolism is a major reason so many are getting on the climate "consensus" bandwagon. In accusing ExxonMobil of giving "more than $19 million since the late 1990s" to public policy institutes that promote climate holocaust "denial," Senate Inquisitors Olympia Snowe and Jay Rockefeller slandered both the donor and recipients. Moreover, this is less than half of what Pew Charitable Trusts and allied foundations contributed to the Pew Center on Climate Change alone over the same period. It's a pittance compared to what US environmental groups spent propagating climate chaos scare stories. It amounts to 30 cents for every $1,000 that the US, EU and UN spent since 1993 (some $80 billion all together) on global warming catastrophe research. And it ignores the fact that the Exxon grants also supported malaria control, Third World economic development and many other efforts. Aside from honest, if unfounded, fears of climate disasters, why might others support climate alarmism? Scientists who use climate change to explain environmental changes improve their chances of getting research grants from foundations, corporations – and US government programs that budget a whopping $6.5 billion for global warming in 2007. They also increase the likelihood of getting headlines and quotes in news stories: "Climate change threatens extinction of rare frogs, scientist says." Climate disaster skeptics face an uphill battle on grants, headlines and quotes. Politicians get to grandstand green credentials, cement relationships with activists who can support reelection campaigns and higher aspirations, magically transform $14-billion in alternative energy pork into ethical planetary protection, and promote policies that otherwise would raise serious eyebrows. Corporate actions that cause even one death are dealt with severely; but praise is heaped on federal mileage standards that cause hundreds of deaths, as cars are downsized and plasticized to save fuel and reduce emissions. High energy prices are denounced at congressional hearings, if due to market forces – but praised if imposed by government "to prevent climate change." Drilling in the Arctic or off our coasts is condemned, even to create jobs, tax revenues and enhanced security; but subsidizing wind power to generate 2% of our electricity is lauded, even if giant turbines despoil millions of acres and kill millions of birds. Alarmist rhetoric has also redefined corporate social responsibility, created the Climate Action Partnership and launched the emerging Enviro-Industrial Complex. Environmental activists have turned climate fears into successful fund-raising tools – and a brilliant strategy for achieving their dream of controlling global resource use, technological change and economic development, through laws, treaties, regulations and pressure campaigns. Recent developments promise to supercharge these efforts. Environmental Defense is collaborating with Morgan Stanley, to promote emission trading systems and other climate change initiatives – giving ED direct monetary and policy stakes in the banking, investment and political arenas, and in any carbon allowance or cap-and-trade programs Congress might enact. Other environmental groups, companies and Wall Street firms will no doubt follow their lead. ED designed and led the disingenuous campaign that persuaded many healthcare agencies to ban DDT, resulting in millions of deaths from malaria. Greenpeace, Sierra Club, Union of Concerned Scientists, ED and other groups still post deceitful claims about DDT on their websites, further delaying progress against this killer disease. By blaming climate change for malaria, they deflect criticism for their vile actions. Climate catastrophe claims enable activists to gain official advisory status with companies and governments on environmental issues. They also make it "ethical" for Rainforest Action Network and other pressure groups to oppose power generation in Third World countries, where few have access to electricity – and thereby keep communities perpetually impoverished. Meanwhile, Prince Charles gets lionized for appropriating 62 first class jetliner seats for his entourage of 20, on a trans-Atlantic trip to receive an environmental prize and lecture Americans on saving the Earth – because at least he didn't use his private jet. Companies in the CAP and EIC can develop and promote new product lines, using tax breaks, subsidies, legal mandates and regulatory provisions to gain competitive advantages. They get favorable coverage from the media, and kid-glove treatment from members of Congress who routinely pillory climate chaos skeptics. Some worry that this could become a license to further redefine corporate ethics, present self-interest as planet-saving altruism, and profit from questionable arrangements with environmental groups and Congress. Certainly, cap-and-trade rules will create valuable property rights and reward companies that reduce CO2 emissions, often by replacing old, inefficient, high-polluting plants that they want to retire anyway. DuPont and BP will get money for biofuels, GE for its portfolio of climate protection equipment, ADM for ethanol, Lehman Brothers for emission trading and other deals. Environmental activists will be able to influence corporate, state and federal policy, and rake in still more cash. Insurance companies can blame global warming for rate increases and coverage denials. Lobbying and deal-brokering will enter a new era. As Thenardier the innkeeper observed in Les Miserables, "When it comes to fixing prices, there are lots of tricks he knows. Jees, it's just amazing how it grows." Indeed, the opportunities to "game the system" will be limited only by one's "eco-magination." To determine the losers, look in the mirror. Activists and politicians are creating a Frankenstein climate monster on steroids. Were it real, we'd need to dismantle our economy and living standards to slay the beast. How else could we eliminate 80–90% of US and EU fossil fuel emissions by 2050, to stabilize carbon dioxide emissions and (theoretically) a climate that has always been anything but stable? Think lifestyles circa 1900, or earlier. Ponder the British environment minister's latest prescription: World War II rationing, no meat or cheese, restrictions on air travel, no veggies that aren't grown locally. France wants a new government agency that would single out, police and penalize countries that "abuse the Earth." Others want to put little solar panels on African huts, while kleptocratic dictators get millions of dollars for trading away their people's right to generate electricity and emit CO2. We should improve energy efficiency, reduce pollution, and develop new energy technologies. But when we demand immediate action to prevent exaggerated or imaginary crises, we stifle debate, railroad through programs that don't work, create enough pork to fill 50 Chicago stockyards, and impose horrendous unintended consequences on countless families. That is shortsighted and immoral.

Was the Reagan Administration the most corrupt ever? Ronald Reagan's Criminal Administration: "By the end of his term, 138 Reagan administration officials had been convicted, had been indicted, or had been the subject of official investigations for official misconduct and/or criminal violations. In terms of number of officials involved, the record of his administration was the worst ever." James Watt, Reagan's Secretary of the Interior was indicted on 41 felony counts for using connections at the Department of Housing and Urban Development to help his private clients seek federal funds for housing projects in Maryland, New Jersey, Massachusetts, Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands. Watt conceded that he had received $500,000 from clients who were granted very favorable housing contracts after he had intervened on their behalf. In testifying before a House committee Watt said: "That's what they offered and it sounded like a lot of money to me, and we settled on it." Watt was eventually sentenced to five years in prison and 500 hours of community service. Although not convicted, Edwin Meese III, resigned as Reagan's Attorney General after having been the subject of investigations by the United States Office of the Independent Counsel on two occasions (Wedtech and Iran-Contra), during the 3 short years he was in office. E. Bob Wallach, close friend and law classmate of Attorney General Edwin Meese, was sentenced to six years in prison and fined $250,000 in connection with the Wedtech influence-peddling scandal. Lyn Nofziger--Convicted on charges of illegal lobbying of White House in Wedtech scandal. Michael Deaver received three years' probation and was fined one hundred thousand dollars after being convicted for lying to a congressional subcommittee and a federal grand jury about his lobbying activities after leaving the White House. The Iran-Contra scandal. In June, 1984, at a National Security Council meeting, CIA Director Casey urged President Reagan to seek third-party aid for the Nicaraguan contras. Secretary of State Schultz warned that it would be an "impeachable offense" if the U.S. government acted as conduit for such secret funding. But that didn't stop them. That same day, Oliver North was seeking third-party aid for the contras. But Reagan, the "teflon President" avoided serious charges or impeachment. Casper Weinberger was Secretary of Defense during Iran-Contra. In June 1992 he was indicted by a federal grand jury on charges of concealing from congressional investigators and prosecutors thousands of pages of his handwritten notes. The personal memoirs taken during high level meetings, detailed events in 1985 and 1986 involving the Iran-Contra affair. Weinberger claimed he was being unfairly prosecuted because he would not provide information incriminating Ronald Reagan. Weinberger was scheduled to go on trial January 5, 1993, where the contents of his notes would have come to light and may have implicated other, unindicted conspirators. While Weinberger was never directly linked to the covert operations phase of the Iran-Contra affair, he is believed to have been involved in the cover-up of the ensuing scandal. According to Special Prosecutor Lawrence Walsh, Weinberger's notes contain evidence of a conspiracy among the highest ranking Reagan Administration officials to lie to congress and the American public. Some of the notes are believed to have evidence against then Vice-President George Bush who pardoned Weinberger to keep him from going to trial. Raymond Donovan, Secretary of Labor indicted for defrauding the New York City Transit Authority of $7.4. million. { Republicans will point out that Donovan was acquitted. And that really matters in Donovan's case, because he was a Republican. But it didn't matter for Clinton or any of his cabinet, most all of whom were acquitted, because they were Democrats!} Elliott Abrams was appointed by President Reagan in 1985 to head the State Department's Latin American Bureau. He was closely linked with ex-White House aide Lt. Col. Oliver North's covert movement to aid the Contras. Working for North, Abrams coordinated inter-agency support for the contras and helped solicit illegal funding from foreign powers as well as domestic contributors. Abrams agreed to cooperate with Iran-Contra investigators and pled guilty to two charges reduced to misdemeanors. He was sentenced in 1991 to two years probation and 100 hours of community service but was pardoned by President George Bush. Robert C. McFarlane was appointed Ronald Reagan's National Security Advisor in October 1983 and become well-known as a champion of the MX missile program in his role as White House liaison to congress. In 1984, Mc Farlane initiated the review of U.S. policy towards Iran that led directly to the arms for hostages deal. He also supervised early National Security Council efforts to support the Contras. Shortly after the Iran-Contra scandal was revealed in early 1987, McFarlane took an overdose of the tranquilizer Valium in an attempt to end his life. In his own words: "What really drove me to despair was a sense of having failed the country." McFarlane pled guilty to four misdemeanors and was sentenced to two years probation and 200 hours of community service. He was also fined $20,000. He received a blanket pardon from President George Bush. Oliver North--Convicted of falsifying and destroying documents, accepting an illegal gratuity, and aiding and abetting the obstruction of Congress. Conviction overturned on appeal due to legal technicalities. John Poindexter, Reagan's national security advisor, --guilty of five criminal counts involving conspiracy to mislead Congress, obstructing congressional inquiries, lying to lawmakers, used "high national security" to mask deceit and wrong-doing. Richard Secord pleaded guilty to a felony charge of lying to Congress over Iran-Contra. Alan D. Fiers was the Chief of the Central Intelligence Agency's Central American Task Force. Fiers pled guilty in 1991 to two counts of withholding information from congress about Oliver North's activities and the diversion of Iran arms sale money to aid the Contras. He was sentenced to one year of probation and 100 hours of community service. Fiers agreed to cooperate with prosecutors in exchange for having his felonies reduced to misdemeanors and his testimony gave a boost to the long standing criminal investigation of Lawrence Walsh, Special Prosecutor. Fiers testified that he and three CIA colleagues knew by mid-1986 that profits from the TOW and HAWK missile sales to Iran were being diverted to the Contras months before it became public knowledge. Alan Fiers received a blanket pardon for his crimes from President Bush. Clair George was Chief of the CIA's Division of Covert Operations under President Reagan. In August 1992 a hung jury led U.S. District Judge Royce Lamberth to declare a mistrial in the case of Clair George who was accused of concealing from Congress his knowledge of the Iran-Contra affair. George had been named by Alan Fiers when Fiers turned state's evidence for Lawrence Walsh's investigation. In a second trial on charges of perjury, false statements and obstruction of justice, George was convicted of lying to two congressional committees in 1986. George faced a maximum five year federal prison sentence and a $20,000 fine for each of the two convictions. Jurors cleared George of five other charges including two counts of lying to a federal grand jury. Those charges would have carried a mandatory 10 months in prison upon conviction. Clair George received a blanket pardon for his crimes from President George Bush. Duane R. (Dewey) Clarridge was head of the CIA's Western European Division under President Reagan. He was indicted on November 29, 1991 for lying to congress and to the Tower Commission that investigated Iran- Contra. Clarridge was charged with five counts of perjury and two counts of making false statements for covering up his knowledge of a November 25, 1985 shipment of HAWK missiles to Iran. Clarridge was also suspected of diverting to the Contras weapons that were originally intended for the Afghan mujahaddeen guerrillas. Clarridge received a blanket pardon for his crimes on Christmas Eve 1992 from President George Bush. Environmental Protection Agency's favoritism toward polluters. Assistant administrator unduly influenced by chemical industry lobbyists. Another administrator resigned after pressuring employees to tone down a critical report on a chemical company accused of illegal pollution in Michigan. The deputy chief of federal activities was accused of compiling an interagency "hit" or "enemies" list, like those kept in the Nixon Watergate period, singling out career employees to be hired, fired or promoted according to political beliefs. Anne Gorscuh Burford resigned amid accusations she politically manipulated the Superfund money. Rita Lavelle was fired after accusing a senior EPA official of "systematically alienating the business community." She was later indicted, tried and convicted of lying to Congress and served three months of a six-month prison sentence. After an extensive investigation, in August 1984, a House of Representatives subcommittee concluded that top-level EPA appointees by Reagan for three years "violated their public trust by disregarding the public health and the environment, manipulating the Superfund program for political purposes, engaging in unethical conduct and participating in other abuses.". Neglected nuclear safety. A critical situation involving nuclear safety had been allowed to develop during the Reagan era. Immense sums, estimated at 200 billion or more, would be required in the 1990s to replace and make safe America's neglected, aging, deteriorating, and dangerous nuclear facilities. Savings & Loan Bail-out. Hundreds of billions of dollars were needed to bail out savings and loan institutions that either had failed during the deregulation frenzy of the eighties or were in danger of bankruptcy. Reckless airline deregulation. Deregulation of airline industry took too broad a sweep, endangering public safety. Additionally: Richard Allen, National Security adviser resigned amid controversy over an honorarium he received for arranging an interview with Nancy Reagan. Richard Beggs, chief administrator at NASA was indicted for defrauding the government while an executive at General Dynamics. Guy Flake, Deputy Secretary of Commerce, resigned after allegations of a conflict of interest in contract negotiations. Louis Glutfrida, Director of the Federal Emergency Management Agency resigned amid allegations of misuses of government property. Edwin Gray, Chairman of the Federal Home Loan Bank was charged with illegally repaying himself and his wife $26,000 in travel costs. Max Hugel, CIA chief of covert operations who resigned after allegations of fraudulent financial dealings. Carlos Campbell, Assistant Secretary of Commerce resigned over charges of awarding federal grants to his personal friends' firms. John Fedders, chief of enforcement for the Securities and Exchange Commission resigned over charges of beating his wife. Arthur Hayes, Commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration resigned over illegal travel reimbursements. J. Lynn Helms, chief of the Federal Aviation Administration resigned over a grand jury investigation of illegal business activities. Marjory Mecklenburg, Deputy Assistant Secretary of the Department of Health and Human Resources resigned over irregularities on her travel vouchers. Robert Nimmo, head of the Veterans Administration resigned when a report criticized him for improper use of government funds. J. William Petro, U.S. Attorney fired and fined for tipping off an acquaintance about a forthcoming Grand Jury investigation. Thomas C. Reed, White House counselor and National Security Council adviser resigned and paid a $427,000 fine for stock market insider trading. Emanuel Savas, Assistant Secretary of HUD resigned over assigning staff members to work on government time on a book that guilty to expense account fraud and accepting kickbacks on government contracts. Charles Wick, Director of the U.S. Information Agency investigated for taping conversations with public officials without their approval.

Did you know that the EU wants to rip away your rights? WHAT THE EU TREATY OF LISBON DOES (legally accurate) * National Platform EU Research and Information Centre 15.02.2008 This document has been prepared by the National Platform EU Research and Information Centre, 24 Crawford Ave., Dublin 9; Tel: 01-8305792; Secretary Anthony Coughlan. It has been vetted for legal accuracy by authorities on Irish constitutional and EU law. Please copy it or adapt it as you please and pass it on to others, without any need of reference to its source. “France was just ahead of all the other countries in voting No. It would happen in all Member States if they have a referendum. There is a cleavage between people and governments…There will be no Treaty if we had a referendum in France, which would again be followed by a referendum in the UK.” - French President Nicolas Sarkozy, at meeting of MEP Group leaders, EUobserver, 14 November 2007 “Public opinion will be led to adopt, without knowing it, the proposals that we dare not present to them directly … All the earlier proposals will be in the new text, but will be hidden and disguised in some way.” - Former French President V.Giscard D’Estaing, Le Monde, 14 June 2007 “The substance of the Constitution is preserved. That is a fact.” - German Chancellor Angela Merkel, speech to the European Parliament, 27 June 2007 An EU Constitution: The Treaty of Lisbon is a revamped version of the treaty which gave the EU its own Constitution over and above the constitutions of its Member States, but which the peoples of France and Holland rejected in referendums in 2005. Instead of accepting that decision the EU Prime Ministers and Presidents decided to give the EU a constitution indirectly rather than directly, but not to call it a constitution, and on no account to hold referendums on it for fear people would reject it again. Why an Irish referendum?: A referendum must be held on it in Ireland however because the Supreme Court laid down in the 1986 Crotty case that sovereignty in this State rests with the Irish people and that only they can surrender sovereignty to the EU by referendum, or else refuse to surrender it as the case might be. The purpose of the referendum would be to change the Irish Constitution so as to make EU law superior to Irish law in the areas set out in the Lisbon Treaty. Lisbon gives the EU a constitution indirectly rather than directly: The two current basic European Treaties are called “The Treaty on European Union (TEU) and “The Treaty on the Functioning of the Union”(TFEU). These two documents include all the previous treaties from the 1957 Rome Treaty to the 2002 Nice Treaty. The EU Constitution which the French and Dutch rejected would have repealed these two treaties and replaced them with a document called “A Constitution for Europe”. The Lisbon Treaty implements 96% of the legal content of this “Constitution for Europe” by proposing amendments to the two basic EU Treaties and thereby turning them into the effective constitution of the new Federal EU that Lisbon would bring about. The following are the main changes Lisbon would make in the EU’s two constituent Treaties: 1. Lisbon makes the EU Constitution superior to the Irish Constitution in all areas of EU law: We would still keep the Irish Constitution, but “Declaration 17 concerning Primacy”, which is attached to Lisbon, makes clear that EU law would have primacy over and be superior to the Irish Constitution and laws in any case of conflict between the two. EU law and national law deal with different areas and matters, but the EU now makes the majority of our new laws each year. The Lisbon Treaty would give the EU the power to make laws binding on us in many new areas and would take that power away from the Irish Dáil and from Irish citizens who elect the Dáil. 2. Lisbon gives the EU the constitutional form of a supranational European Federal State and turns Ireland and the other Member States into regions or provinces of this Federation: It does this in three legal steps: (a) giving the new European Union which it would bring into being its own legal personality and independent corporate existence for the first time, separate from and superior to its Member States; (b) abolishing the European Community which we have been members of since 1973 and replacing it with the new Union; and (c) bringing all spheres of public policy either actually or potentially within the scope of the new Union. From the inside this new post-Lisbon EU would seem to be based on treaties between States. From the outside it would look like a State itself. Lisbon would then make us all real citizens of this new Federal EU for the first time, owing to it the normal citizen’s duty of obedience to its laws and loyalty to its authority. One can only be a citizen of a State and all States must have citizens. We would still retain our Irish citizenship, but the rights and duties attached to that would be subordinate to those of our EU citizenship in any case of conflict between the two. The EU’s authority would be superior. Post-Lisbon, we would be like citizens of Virginia vis-a-vis the USA or citizens of Bavaria vis-a-vis Federal Germany. This new Federal EU would sign Treaties with other States, would have its own political President, Foreign Minister and foreign and security policy, its own diplomatic service and voice at the UN, and its own Public Prosecutor. It would make most of our laws and would decide what our basic rights are in all areas of EU law. 3. Lisbon shifts influence over law-making and decision-taking in the EU towards the Big States and away from the smaller ones like Ireland: It does this by replacing the voting system for making EU laws that has existed since the 1957 Rome Treaty by a primarily population-based system which would give most influence to the Member States with big populations and reduce the influence of smaller ones like Ireland. Under Lisbon a “weighted” or “qualified” majority vote (QMV) for making EU laws in future would be 15 States out of 27 as long as they included 65% of the EU’s total population. When Ireland joined the then EEC in 1973 we had 3 votes in making European laws as against 10 each for the Big States, a ratio of one-third. Under the current Nice Treaty arrangements we have 7 votes as against their 29 each, a ratio of one-quarter. Under Lisbon Ireland would have 4 million people as against Germany’s 82 million, a ratio of one-twentieth, and an average of 60 million each for France, Italy and Britain, a ratio of one-fifteenth. Under Lisbon Ireland’s voting weight vis-a-vis the other 26 Member States would fall to one-third its present level, from 2% to 0.8%. 4. Lisbon removes Ireland’s right to a permanent EU Commissioner: The Commission is the body which has the monopoly of proposing all EU laws, which are then made by the Council of Ministers, with some powers of amendment for the European Parliament. Under Lisbon Ireland would have no member on the Commission for one out of every three Commission terms. This means that for five years out of every fifteen, laws affecting all our lives would be put forward entirely by a committee of EU officials on which there was no representative from Ireland. The Big EU States would lose their right to a permanent Commissioner also, but their size and weight give them other means of exerting influence on that key body. As Dr Garret FitzGerald and others have emphasised over the years, being represented on the EU Commission is especially important for smaller States like Ireland. 5. Lisbon deprives the Irish Government of its right to decide who Ireland’s Commissioner would be when it comes to our turn to be on the Commission: It provides that Ireland’s present right to “propose” a national Commissioner and to have that proposal accepted by the others, would be replaced by a right to make “suggestions” regarding a name, but with no guarantee that a particular suggestion would be accepted by the 27 Prime Ministers and Presidents who would decide the list of Commissioners as a whole by qualified majority vote. If the Irish Government were to suggest someone as its EU Commissioner who had, for example, antagonised the government of some other Member State in the past, or who was regarded as not enthusiastic enough for further EU integration, it could be asked to suggest another name as more acceptable. The Commission President, appointed by vote of the Prime Ministers and Presidents, would decide in practice who Ireland’s Commissioner would be. The new Commission President could ask a Commissioner to resign at any time, just as a Taoiseach has full control over his cabinet. The new Commission would be like an EU Government, except that this government would not be elected by the citizens. 6. Lisbon gives the European Union the power to make laws in 32 new areas that are removed from the Dail and other National Parliaments: These new areas of EU law-making include civil and criminal law, justice and policing, immigration, public services, energy, transport, tourism, space, sport, culture, civil protection, public health and the EU budget. There would be majority voting also by EU Foreign Ministers in some areas of foreign policy. The EU Council of Ministers would obtain power to take decisions by qualified majority vote on many matters other than EU laws - up to 68 in all - so that Member States would no longer exercise a veto regarding them. This increase in EU powers simultaneously increases the personal power of the 27 national politicians who make up the EU Council of Ministers by enabling them to make further laws behind closed doors for 500 million Europeans, while taking power away from the citizens and national Parliaments which elect those politicians and which have made these laws for their own countries up to now. Each shift of power from the national level to the EU entails a further shift of power from the Irish Dail and people to Irish Government Ministers at EU level. It hollows out our national democracy further. The Treaty also increases the power of the non-elected Brussels Commission, which has the monopoly of proposing European laws to the Council of Ministers, by giving it many new policy areas to propose laws for. 7. Lisbon is a self-amending Treaty which would open the way to harmonising Ireland’s company taxes: Lisbon inserts a new Article 48 into the “Treaty on European Union”, the “simplified revision procedure”, which permits the Prime Ministers and Presidents by unanimity to shift most areas of the treaties where unanimity now exists to qualified majority voting without the need for new treaties or referendums. This is called the “escalator clause”, which former French President Giscard d’Estaing said was “a central innovation” of the EU Constitution he helped draft. The laws cover areas such as company taxation, but exclude defence and military matters. A National Parliament can veto this mechanism, but citizens can not, as we would have accepted this method of rule by agreeing the Lisbon Treaty. After Lisbon is ratified there would be no need, practically speaking, for further EU referendums. If the Taoiseach of the day has not objected to his fellow Prime Ministers and Presidents, the switch to majority voting on company taxes would go through. If he has not objected, the National Parliament could revolt against him and object, but it is not required to vote for the use of the “escalator”. This leaves the citizens in the position of depending entirely on the backbone of the current Taoiseach or his successor to continue defending Ireland’s company tax position, which has been so important in bringing foreign firms to Ireland and is central to our modern economic development. Already the EU Commission has drafted proposals for introducing a Common EU Tax Base for Company taxes, but has postponed its publication until after the Irish referendum. Does this encourage confidence that the “escalator clause” will not be used to bring in EU tax harmonisation? Lisbon opens another door to EU tax harmonisation if national differences in company tax lead to “distortion of competition“(Art.93 TFEU). This would enable the EU Court of Justice to apply the internal market rules on competition matters, where majority voting applies, to matters of company tax. This could be another way around the present unanimity requirement for such taxes. Lisbon also permits the EU to raise its “own resources” by means of any kind of EU tax to finance the attainment of its many objectives(Art.269 TFEU). The 27 EU Prime Ministers and Presidents would have to decide unanimously what taxes to impose and once National Parliaments approved, that would be that. There would be no need of a referendum in Ireland or anywhere else in the EU, for we would have permitted this development by voting for Lisbon. It is hard to imagine the 27 EU Prime Ministers and Presidents refraining from exercising this power to give the new Union its own major tax revenues once it is up and running under their political direction. 8. Lisbon gives the EU the power to decide our human and civil rights: The new Treaty gives the EU the final power to decide what our rights are in all areas of EU law, including Member States when implementing EU law. It would do this by making the rights set out in the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights legally binding for the first time (Art.6 TEU). This would make the 27 judges of the EU Court of Justice in Luxembourg the final decider of our rights in many areas, instead of the Irish Supreme Court or the Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg, which decides these rights at present. If Lisbon gives the EU Court of Justice the power to decide what our rights are in the large area of EU law, it is likely that the Commission will in time propose laws to ensure their uniform application across all EU States, as has happened in the case of the other Treaties up to now. The EU Court of Justice has laid down in several court cases that National Law must be applied in a way that is consistent with EU law, for the latter has supremacy in any conflict between the two. This principle must logically apply to rights issues also. This raises the real possibility of clashes over rights standards in sensitive areas where there are significant national differences between the Member States at present: for example, the right to life, the right to marry and found a family, the right to strike, rules of evidence in court, the rights of children and the elderly, trial by jury, censorship law, the legalisation of hard drugs and prostitution, rights attaching to State churches, conscientious objection to military service, succession, property, family law, labour law. 9. Lisbon provides that if one-third of National Parliaments object to the Commission’s proposal for an EU law, the Commission must reconsider it, but not necessarily abandon it: It might reword the draft law, as happened with the Constitution, or if it considered the objection was not justified, it might ignore it. The European Parliament cannot propose a single European law, but it gets more influence under the new Union’s Constitutional structures. It can put down amendments to draft laws coming from the Council and Commission in the 32 law-making areas that would be transferred to Brussels from the National Parliaments, although the Commission and Council must agree them if they are to pass. National Parliaments would of course lose their power. Ireland has only 12 members out of 750 in the European Parliament. When Ireland was part of the UK in the 19th century it had 100 members out of 600 at Westminster, where all UK laws were both proposed and made. The Lisbon Treaty also provides for a right of petition to the Commission by one million European citizens asking it to propose a new EU law, but there is no obligation on the Commission to do anything apart from “considering” such a request. It can ignore it or reject it. In other words the citizens, if they get a million signatures, have the right to complain and then hope for the best. 10. Lisbon militarizes the EU further: The Treaty requires Member States “to progressively improve their military capabilities”. It introduces a “start-up” fund for common foreign policy and military operations to be financed by Member States outside the Union budget (Art.28). It contains an Article which the current Slovenian EU presidency has admitted is a “mutual defence clause” (Art.28A.7): “If a Member State is the victim of armed aggression on its territory, the other Member States shall have towards it an obligation of aid and assistance by all means in their power.” This is a new departure for the EU and would commit all Member States including Ireland. In the light of this mutual defence clause there would be no constitutional need for a further referendum in Ireland before we committed ourselves operationally to the military defence of other EU countries, for Lisbon would be that referendum. Lisbon also allows sub-groups of Member States to embark on military missions on behalf of the EU, without a UN mandate, while the others “constructively abstain”. Is Lisbon necessary to make the EU more efficient? The advent of 12 new Member States has not made the negotiation of new EU laws more difficult since they joined the EU. On the contrary, a study by the Science-Po University in Paris calculated that new rules have been adopted a quarter times more quickly since the enlargement from 15 to 27 Member States compared with the two years before enlargement. The study also showed that the 15 older Member States block proposed EU laws twice as often as the newcomers. Professor Helen Wallace of the London School of Economics has found that the EU institutions are working as well as they ever did despite the enlargement of the EU from 15 to 27 members. She found that “the evidence of practice since May 2004 suggests that the EU’s institutional processes and practice have stood up rather robustly to the impact of enlargement.” The Nice Treaty voting arrangements thus seem to be working well. If we reject the Lisbon Treaty will we be forced to vote on it again? Europe Minister Dick Roche has stated that if we vote No to Lisbon, we will not be asked to vote again on the same Treaty, as happened when people voted No to the Treaty of Nice. Nor can we be ostracised or thrown out of the EU - anymore than that happened to the French and Dutch when they rejected the EU Constitution, of which Lisbon is a revamped version. We need to send Lisbon back to the EU Prime Ministers and Presidents and tell them that we want a better deal - for Ireland’s sake and Europe’s sake. We want a more democratic, not a less democratic EU. Ireland can do it, on our own behalf and on behalf of all the peoples of Europe, if we have confidence in ourselves and resist the misrepresentations of what Lisbon is really about, and all the bullying and threats. A Vote No is a Yes to something better!

represents a firm's big picture statement, describing a desired? Which of the following can be identified as a best statement that represents a firm's big picture statement, describing a desired end-state, general in scope and not restrictive? a. Corporate philosophy statement b. Company creed c. Vision statement d. Mission statement 2. One of the top level manager of a large manufacturing plant uses to spend her day trying to ensure that the material wastage is not more than 10%. She spends her day performing the management process of ________. a. Planning b. Organizing c. Leading d. Controlling 3. All of the following are key opportunities and threats in external environment because of political, government & legal forces except: a. Tax rates b. Social security programs c. Cross boarder relationships d. Patent laws 4. Which of the following statements in relation to the five forces framework is correct? a. The framework assists in developing a broad perspective on the environment within which an organization is operating. b. The framework is not appropriate in non-profit organizations. c. The framework is a mean of identifying the forces which affect the level of competition in an industry or sector. d. The framework identifies the major stakeholders of an organization. 5. Financial ratios are helpful in analyzing the relationship among: a. All assets and liabilities of a business b. All profits and costs of a business c. All functional areas of a business d. All sales and profitability of a business 6. Internal audit is done _________ a. Before external audit b. After external audit c. Parallel to external audit d. Vertical to external audit 7. Which of the following may not be considered as the component of a mission statement? a. Purpose and values of the organization b. Business the organization wants to be in c. Main objectives supporting the company in accomplishing its mission d. Concentrates future and provides clear decision-making criteria 8. Bargaining power of consumers is high if: a. Differentiation of competitors’ products is low b. Switching costs are low for substitute products c. The buyer has little information about the market d. The buyer requires a high quality product for own production 9. The magnitude of changes that may affect an organization’s survival owing to all of the following except: a. Merger-mania b. Demographics c. E-commerce d. Dubious firms 10. Which of the following requires a firm to establish annual objectives, devise policies, motivate employees and allocate resources for the execution of strategies? a. Strategy formulation b. Strategy implementation c. Strategy evaluation d. Strategy estimation

Please I need help with my HW? Please read and let me know how you would analyze this article:The Water Crisis: Analysis and Proposals By Celine Tan Water and sanitation is the first of five priority action areas under the WEHAB plan for the post-WSSD implementation of sustainable development. The challenge of providing safe and clean water and sanitary conditions for an increasing world population, in the face of rising inequities, is phenomenal. Forty percent of the world’s population, in 80 countries, currently suffer from serious water shortages. A billion people worldwide lack access to safe drinking water and 2.4 billion people lack access to adequate sanitation (Global Economic Outlook 2002). Yet, the biggest threat to universal access to clean water and adequate sanitation is not mother nature but corporate globalisation. Privatisation of water is aggressively exported to the developing world under the rubric of poverty reduction and debt relief strategies, free trade and economic development. By turning a scarce resource into an economic commodity, the world’s economic leaders and policy planners claim that existing water resources can be managed and consumed efficiently in accordance with competitive market principles. These claims are not only misguided, they are deceitful. There are two myths being projected: first, that placing a price on water will encourage conservation and wise water consumption. Secondly, that market competition will lead to more consumer choice and better services. In reality, the water sector is monopolistic when placed in the hands of the market. It is thus alarming that the commodification of water resources is now heralded as the answer to the world’s water woes. Monopoly and subsidies for corporations Water is a US$400 billion global business, controlled by a handful of European transnational companies and consortiums, namely French multinationals Vivendi and Suez Lyonnaise, SAUR and British water companies Thames Water, Anglia Water and United Utilities. The global drive towards privatisation of water services is thus pursued not by a collective of democratically elected governments acting in the interest of the world’s population, but by a cartel of corporations motivated by profit and market conquest. To make matters worse, these companies are subsidised by their governments (and invariably their taxpayers) through support from domestic export credit agencies, and by multilateral development banks, such as the World Bank and the African Development Bank. They are also subsidised by developing countries who raise credit from international financial institutions to upgrade their water systems prior to private takeover. This corporate subsidy comes at the expense of consumers, most of them in developing countries, who are made to pay for what is a necessity of life. For the poor this means no access to water. Additional loans to facilitate the privatisation process are raised by developing country governments from multilateral and bilateral sources. Often, these loans are also used to finance the creation of an ‘enabling environment’ for foreign water and wastewater investors. This includes the drafting of local investor protection legislation to guard against re-nationalisation of the water industry and to provide for hefty compensation for any attempt to renege (for good reasons) against the privatisation contracts. In many cases, corporate access to a developing country’s water system is paved by a loan or debt relief conditionality requiring the poor or indebted country to privatise its water and sanitation services. For example, the IMF insisted that Tanzania privatise its Dar es Salaam Water and Sewerage Authority (DAWSA) as a condition of its debt relief package under the Heavily Indebted Poor Countries (HIPC) Initiative. Fallacy of privatisation Experience shows that the privatisation of water services cannot ensure universal delivery of safe water and efficient sanitation. Privatisation imposes additional financial obligations on governments. They may have to bail out failed privatisation project, and also shoulder the costly legal risks of rescinding a privatisation contract with a wealthy transnational, even if the company’s performance is unsatisfactory. Argentina, Hungary and Bolivia have found that the legal claims for compensation by private water companies in Tucuman, Szeged and Cochabamba respectively, have made terminating contracts prohibitively expensive. The dominance of foreign water companies and the liberalised investment climate - mostly facilitated by structural adjustment, and now under trade agreements including those under the WTO Ð in developing countries will also ensure that a large portion of profits from water privatisation will not accrue to the countries themselves but are repatriated abroad instead. The imposition of full-cost water pricing as a result of privatisation will only deprive more and more people of access to clean and safe water by forcing poor communities to seek alternative sources of water for consumption, such as untreated well water and water from sewage-ridden urban rivers. Forced upon rich and poor, consumers and industrial producers, similar rates for water use will also result in greater income disparity and deeper social cleavages, leading to higher risks of civil unrest. In 2000, martial law was declared in the Bolivian city of Cochabamba as a result of city-wide riots precipitated by high water prices. A private consortium led by International Water doubled the water prices to city residents. Water bills went up by 35% and some, twice that. The World Bank supported full-cost water pricing and prohibited any use of its structural adjustment loans to subsidise water services for the poor. Future fears and WSSD outcomes There is no agreement on the text in the WSSD Draft Plan of Implementation that commits governments to supporting the UN Millennium Development Goal of halving, by 2015, the proportion of people unable to reach, or afford, safe drinking water and access improved sanitation (paragraphs 7 and 7[alt]). However, the most pressing concerns over universal coverage of water and sanitation services are not expressed in these bracketed paragraphs. Rather, they are reflected in the general lack of political will demonstrated by developed countries to address the systemic issues leading to a crisis of sustainable development in the south, and the alarming emphasis placed on public-private partnership funding and implementation of sustainable development programmes. The relinquishing of responsibility by developed countries is marked by their reluctance to commit to specific disbursements of ODA and by repeated references to voluntary partnerships and initiatives as a means of financing WSSD programmatic outcomes. In the absence of firm commitments by governments, Type II partnerships on water and sanitation services will only increase private sector involvement in this crucial area. The private sector is already identified as a key implementer of the ‘Water, Sanitation and Hygiene (WASH) for All Initiative’ involving 28 countries, six UN agencies, the World Bank, and the Asian and African Development Banks. Another major threat to universal access to water and sanitation is liberalisation under the WTO’s rules. Although Member countries have the right to liberalise at their own pace, and even choose not to open up a sector under the WTO’s General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS), there is tremendous pressure especially on developing countries to liberalise. Thus in the ongoing negotiations at the WTO, developed countries are submitting extensive ÒrequestsÓ that seek access to every sector in the developing world, including water services and sanitation. If developing countries succumb, privatisation of water services initiated under World Bank and IMF structural adjustment programmes could become permanent under the binding rules of the WTO. Once a country is locked into the GATS regime, the right of its government to regulate liberalized service sectors will be diminished, paving the way for foreign transnationals to enter the domestic market. Any attempt to reverse the situation would be subject to WTO disciplines and penalties. Any real effort to achieve the Millennium Development Goal must therefore include commitments to review loan conditionalities that impose privatisation and countries must not be pressured to offer water services under GATS liberalisation. Essential services should be exempted from GATS. Conclusion Privatisation does not address the deeper economic and ecological issues of water shortages. Questions of why there are water shortages in countries not under water stress are not resolved by shifting responsibility of service provision to private companies. Water management and water distribution are also key factors in determining water supply and universal coverage. Until and unless rich countries fulfil their commitment to provide resources for developing countries to build solid, cost-effective water delivery systems which support the needs of the world’s population equitably and ecologically, the water woes of the world will not go away. At the same time, all governments need to recognise and support the diversity and replication of community water management systems and practices. These have proven in many countries to be the most sustainable approach to rural water management for rural populations. The WSSD process and the last 10 years of the work of the CSD have called for good and best practices in sustainable development. However, where water resources are concerned the trend and emphasis are privatisation which has proven destructive. Firm commitments must be made at the WSSD to reverse the trend of corporate takeover in the water and sanitation sector, rather than to accelerate the process of privatisation and corporate monopoly. Undermining the sovereign power of governments to regulate supply of water in their countries and passing the bucket onto private transnationals to steward the world’s water resources would probably be a most anti-development and anti-ecological step.

why did Ms.Li Xiaoxi( Cecilia Lee) from HOK defame EurOrient Financial Group by every possible means? EurOrient Financial Group: Mr. Nechemia Seeks To Blunt Allegations EurOrient Financial Group (“EurOrient”), a Delaware corporation, is seeking to blunt allegations within libelous articles published on the Internet, (at Yahoo.com and at least on a dozen other Web portals) alleging maladministration by EurOrient and its personnel. EurOrient believes that Ms. Xiaoxi Li, the Marketing Director of Hellmuth, Obata and Kassabaum (“HOK”), based in Beijing, China, is the author of these articles, based upon her own statements made in United States Federal Court. HOK is the U.S.-headquartered architecture, interior design, engineering, planning and consulting firm. As per a statement made by the Board of Directors of EurOrient to the press, “those allegations are outrageous falsehoods and representing an obvious mistreatment and an injustice.” The articles were published after Ms. Xiaoxi Li (who is also known as Ms. Cecilia Lee), Mrs. Xuan K. Le, and Mr. Xiaozhuang Li were named as the prime suspects for breaking into EurOrient corporate property and removing millions of dollars worth of art and antiquities, intellectual properties, and other properties belonging to EurOrient or its subsidiaries. This break-in occurred between July and September 2006 and was uncovered in September 2006. This crime against EurOrient is under investigation by the Los Angeles Police Department, and is considered to be amongst the largest recent art thefts within the United States of America. The articles accuse EurOrient of various acts involving business and financial misconduct, and also accuse Mr. Ron Nechemia, Chairman of the Board of the Directors of EurOrient and the founding father of private sector global development banking, of immoral and unethical practices. In addition, the articles attempt to create a false impression that EurOrient is experiencing serious legal issues before the courts for security violations from a legal action (Corral Vs EurOrient) which was filed against various subsidiaries and affiliates of EurOrient in 2003 and EurOrient was relieved by the Court for failure to show cause (on demurrers). Similarly, the case of Ms. Xuan K. Le Vs EurOrient was successfully defended by EurOrient on October 29, 2007. “Those people that choose to disobey the rule of law and make false allegations set before us the clearest of divides: between those who seek order, and those who spread chaos; between those who work for peaceful change, and those who adopt the methods of gangsters; between those who honor human rights, and those who deliberately take the lives of men, women, and children without mercy or shame”, said Mr. Nechemia, Chairman of the EurOrient Board of Directors. Mr. Nechemia added that “Today humanity struggles against all kinds of terrorism: the struggle against inequality in international economic relations. It is the struggle against ignorance, injustice, discrimination, intolerance, exclusion and poverty. There will be no peace if we do not eradicate these scourges.” The Treasury Board of EurOrient stresses that “the allegations of misconduct and maladministration are serious: they are matters of great and legitimate interest to the public at large in developing countries, to economies in transition, as well as in the United States. They demand a full inquiry that is efficient and comprehensive, yet fair and impartial toward each individual and entity within the scope of the investigation. Our aim is to promptly provide the international community with a full and accurate accounting of what occurred, as well as the results of the investigations or any other action that might be taken. That work must not be impeded.” Further reports will result from any substantive findings on those matters.

Marijuana essay/letter? I want to know what you think about it and if you can correct it. I also don't know what to say in my concluding sentence. thx. Dear Barbara Boxer, Thank you for taking your time to acknowledge my thoughts and position. The reason I am writing to you is because I feel that the legalization of marijuana to legalize possessing and smoking the plant in California, beside for medical uses, should be reconsidered for another vote. It seems, to me, highly hypocritical to have both cigarettes and alcohol be legal and yet have marijuana that produces the same basic effect. I believe I have a firm stance on my position because I have packed my head with a copious amount of diverse researched information concerning the marijuana plant. There would be many commendable outcomes by making marijuana legal, but I also grasp the consequences of the action. Benefiting California’s government would be as helpful as giving a voracious dog a slab of meat. We all know that California is in a need of finance assistance. I believe by making the marijuana plant legal in California, it would help our state tremendously. Our government could market and tax this plant resulting in a surplus of money that could be spent to help pay off our state’s debt or even help pay for educational programs to help benefit the future’s children. This is the kind of help we need in California. The plant would be easy to cultivate because it is a weed, and a fairly vivacious one at that. If we passed a law stating marijuana, sold by the state of California, is legal to smoke and possess, our state’s government would in a better finical situation than it is currently. How much time is spent busting people who use marijuana in California? If California legalized marijuana, more time for law enforcement could go towards arresting other criminals. It would also cut down on California’s prison population, thus save tax payers a lot of money. If our state marketed marijuana it would decrease the street value of it leading to the decrease of funds in drug dealer’s pockets. I believe law enforcement has more important responsibilities such as exporting illegal immigrants out of California, shootings, robberies, etc. than arresting 60,481 individuals a year for marijuana possession. Also, by not legalizing marijuana in California, there is wasted jail space and clogged up court systems that should be occupied by other serious felons. Fighting the war on Marijuana is an expensive combat. If we would stop the reason for the “marijuana war” by legalizing the plant in our state, then there would be no war. To every issue there are always two different views. The legalization of marijuana abides by this truth. I feel that the one of the consequences of legalizing the plant to smoke and possess it in California would be the harmful risks it attains. For example, Smoking marijuana regularly can impair the cells in the bronchial passages which defend the body against inhaled microorganisms and decrease the ability of the immune cells in the lungs to fight off fungi, bacteria, and tumor cells. There would be no way of stopping this from happening to marijuana smokers. If California could pass a state law stating that a limited quantity could be acquired weekly, it would slow the damaging of the cells in a smoker and other malignant risks. Another consequence would be the rising number of DUIs in California. To decrease that amount, California would need to heighten the consequence of driving while high or inebriated such as 2 years in jail and/or a 5,000 dollar fine. I understand the consequences of legalizing marijuana, but if California would deal with it properly, we would acknowledge the fact that marijuana has more beneficial outcomes than malicious effects.

What really happened at Walter Reed Hospital? Walter Reed Crumbled as Army Delayed Private Maintenance Contract Sunday , March 18, 2007 AP ADVERTISEMENT WASHINGTON — An Army contract to privatize maintenance at Walter Reed Medical Center was delayed more than three years amid bureaucratic bickering and legal squabbles that led to staff shortages and a hospital in disarray just as the number of severely wounded soldiers from Iraq and Afghanistan was rising rapidly. Documents from the investigative and auditing arm of Congress map a trail of bid, rebid, protests and appeals between 2003, when Walter Reed was first selected for outsourcing, and 2006, when a five-year, $120 million contract was finally awarded. The disputes involved hospital management, the Pentagon, Congress and IAP Worldwide Services Inc., a company with powerful political connections and the only private bidder to handle maintenance, security, public works and management of military personnel. While medical care was not directly affected, needed repairs went undone as the staff shrank from almost 300 to less than 50 in the last year and hospital officials were unable to find enough skilled replacements. An investigative series by The Washington Post last month sparked a furor on Capitol Hill after it detailed subpar conditions at the 98-year-old hospital in northwest Washington and substandard services for patients. Three top-ranking military officials, including the secretary of the Army, were ousted in part for what critics said was the Pentagon's mismanaged effort to reduce costs and improve efficiency at the Army's premier military hospital while the nation was at war. IAP is owned by a New York hedge fund whose board is chaired by former Treasury Secretary John Snow, and it is led by former executives of Kellogg, Brown and Root, the subsidiary spun off by Texas-based Halliburton Inc., the oil services firm once run by Vice President Dick Cheney. IAP finally got the job in November 2006, but further delays caused by the Army and Congress delayed work until Feb. 4, two weeks before the Post series and two years after the number of patients at the hospital hit a record 900. "The Army unfortunately did not devote sufficient resources to the upfront planning part of this, and when you do that, you suffer every step of the way," said Paul Denett, administrator for federal procurement policy at the Office of Management and Budget, the White House unit that prepares the president's budget and oversees government contracts. The contract includes management of Building 18, which houses soldiers with minor injuries and was highlighted in the Post series as symptomatic of substandard conditions: black mold on the walls of patient rooms, rodent and cockroach infestation, and shoddy mattresses. Those 54 rooms are now vacant. Interior work cannot be started until a badly damaged roof is repaired, and that will need another contract because it's not covered in the IAP contract, Walter Reed officials said. "These rooms are exactly as they were left," Sgt. Gary Rhett, manager of Building 18, said Thursday. "No changes have been made." The Army has confirmed the timing of the contract delays but declined several requests for comment on why the protest and appeal process took so long, even as more and more injured soldiers were arriving. The trail goes back to the end of the Clinton administration. The Army began studying the cost benefits of privatization in 2000. When President Bush took office, he mandated the competitive outsourcing of 425,000 federal jobs. At the time, the Pentagon was aggressively pushing for increased outsourcing, and in June 2003, then-Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld told a Senate committee he was considering outsourcing up to 320,000 nonmilitary support jobs. That's the same year that the Army asked for bids on Walter Reed and, coincidentally, the same year the United States invaded Iraq. One company responded: Johnson Controls World Services Inc., which would be acquired by IAP in March 2005. It initially bid $132 million, but it and Walter Reed's then-management agreed that the Army was underestimating the cost. By September 2004, the Army had decided it would be cheaper to continue with current management, which said it could do the work for $124.5 million. Johnson Controls filed a protest with the Government Accountability Office. The protest was dismissed in June 2005, but the Army agreed to reopen bidding three months later to include additional costs for services. In January 2006, after two rounds of protests by IAP and two appeals by Walter Reed employees to the U.S. Army Medical Command, IAP was named the winner, according to Steve Sanderson, a Walter Reed spokesman. Instead, in an unusual turn of events, the contract wasn't awarded for another 11 months, the GAO said. Walter Reed officials blame several factors, including an additional protest to the GAO filed by Deputy Garrison Commander Alan D. King, a separate appeal to the U.S. Army Medical Command by Walter Reed's public works director, at least one intervention by Congress, and delays on required congressional notifications about government employee dismissals. IAP spokeswoman Arlene Mellinger said "it was up to the Army to decide when to begin that contract." The company was ready to start at any time, she added. In August 2006, led by Sen. Barbara Mikulski, D-Md., lawmakers asked then-Army Secretary Francis J. Harvey to hold off on the contract until Congress finished work on the fiscal 2007 defense appropriations bill. Congress approved that bill Sept. 29. The Army's plan then was to eliminate 360 federal jobs at Walter Reed in November and turn the work over to IAP, according to the American Federation of Government Employees, a federal workers' trade union. But the Army failed to notify Congress 45 days in advance, as required by law, so the turnover was delayed until early this year. Then it was IAP's turn to have problems. When work finally began at the hospital, IAP made an immediate request, which the Army approved, to hire 87 temporary skilled workers for up to four months "to ease the turbulence caused by employees being placed into positions or other installations and otherwise finding new jobs early," said Sanderson, the Walter Reed official. However, a "tight" job market in the Washington area meant that only 10 qualified temporary employees were found, he added. Meanwhile, injured soldiers continue to arrive weekly to a short-handed, deteriorated hospital, which the Army still plans to close in 2011.

How many receipt-less voting machines are used nation-wide?

How many receipt-less voting machines are used nation-wide?

Cumulative voting is a method of voting designed to allow minority shareholders representation on the board of 18. Damages awarded in a shareholder's derivative suit are paid to the shareholder who filed the suit. (Points: 4) True False 19. Delivery of intangible personal property must be done by symbolic delivery. (Points: 4) True False 20. A gift made during one's lifetime is a gift causa mortis. (Points: 4) True False 21. A gift made to a dying donee is a gift inter vivos. (Points: 4) True False 22. In a bailment, possession of the property is transferred to the bailee. (Points: 4) True False 23. In a bailment, title to the property is transferred to the bailee. (Points: 4) True False 24. For an effective bailment, the bailed property must be physically delivered to the bailee. (Points: 4) True False 25. A gratuitous bailment is one in which consideration is not required. (Points: 4) True False 26. Regional Bank wants to perfect its security interest in timber owned by Standard Lumber, Inc. Most likely, a financing statement should be filed with (Points: 4) the local chamber of commerce. the county clerk. the federal loan officer. the secretary of state's office. 27. Fine Furniture Store sells household consumer goods. To create a purchase-money security interest, Fine Furniture must (Points: 4) assign, to a collecting agent, a portion of its accounts payable. assign, to a collecting agent, a portion of its accounts receivable. extend credit for part or all of the purchase price of the goods. refer purchasers to a third-party lender. 28. Joyce works for Kappa Services Corporation as an independent contractor, and not as an employee, if (Points: 4) Joyce says that she works as an independent contractor. Joyce works on a permanent basis. Kappa does not control Joyce's work. Kappa withholds taxes from its payments to Joyce. 29. Holly takes temporary leave from her job at Interstate Assembly Company to care for her new baby. When she attempts to return to work, Interstate refuses to reinstate her. Under the Family and Medical Leave Act, Holly may be entitled to (Points: 4) damages only. damages or job reinstatement only. double damages, job reinstatement, a promotion, and more. nothing. 30. Standard Company denies a promotion to Tony, a member of a minority, when he fails to pass a required test. Few members of minorities have passed the test. The number of promoted employees who are members of minorities does not reflect their percentage in the local labor market. In a suit against Standard, if Tony can show a connection between the test and the number of promoted minority members, (Points: 4) it must be proved that Standard had discriminatory intent. it must be proved that Standard has other discriminatory practices. it must be proved that the test had a discriminatory purpose. no evidence of discriminatory intent is necessary. 31. Ken, who is Hispanic, applies for a job at Local Plant, Inc. The interviewer says that Local Plant does not hire Hispanics. This is (Points: 4) impermissible discrimination on the basis of race. permissible discrimination because it is an honest response. permissible discrimination because it occurs before employment. permissible discrimination because "Ken" is not an Hispanic name. 32. Macro Corporation replaces Neal, a fifty-two-year-old employee, with Olivia. Neal files a suit against Macro under the Age Discrimination in Employment Act of 1967. To establish a prima facie case, Neal must show that he was discharged under circumstances that give rise to (Points: 4) a certainty of discrimination. an impossibility of discrimination. an inference of discrimination. an unlikelihood of discrimination. 33. Eagle Equipment Corporation discharges Jay, who then sues Eagle for employment discrimination under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Eagle learns that Jay lied on his job application and argues that, had Eagle known of the lie, it would have fired him. This is (Points: 4) an affirmative action defense. a bona fide occupational qualification defense. a business necessity defense. no defense. 34. Amy wants to go into the business of construction contracting. Among the reasons that would probably convince Amy to set up her business as a sole proprietorship would be (Points: 4) its greater organizational flexibility. its limited liability. its perpetual existence. the ease of transferring the business to other family members. 37. Sandy is a limited partner in Total Enterprises, a limited partnership. To avoid personal liability for partnership obligations, Sandy must not (Points: 4) acquire an interest in the firm. contribute property to the firm. engage in activities independent of the firm's business. participate in the firm's management. 38. Dan is considering forms of business organization for his financial advisory firm. Like most states, Dan's state requires that to form a limited liability company, he must file with a central state agency (Points: 4) articles of certification. articles of formation. articles of organization. no specific documents. 39. Web Services, LLC, is a member-managed limited liability company. If the law in Web's state is like the law in most states, unless the members have agreed otherwise, decisions are made by (Points: 4) majority vote. minority vote. plurality vote. seniority vote. 40. Omega Sports Corporation licenses its trademark to Personality Products, Inc., to use in selling caps, sweatshirts, and similar goods. This is (Points: 4) a franchise. an entrepreneur. a principal-agent relationship. a sole proprietorship. 41. Jill and Kelly are architects and members of Jill & Kelly, P.C., a professional corporation. Jill supervises Lucy, an employee of the firm. As a member, Jill (Points: 4) is personally liable for any tort committed by Kelly. has limited liability for any of Kelly's acts of malpractice. has no liability for any torts committed by Kelly or Lucy. may be personally liable for malpractice committed by Lucy. 42. Stan is a registered agent for Transport, Inc., which incorporated in Utah. As a registered agent, Stan (Points: 4) agreed to buy stock in Transport before it existed. applied to Utah on behalf of Transport to obtain its corporate charter. does business for Transport in Utah. receives legal documents on behalf of Transport. 43. Lou and Mary act as the incorporators for National Corporation. After the first board of directors is chosen, subsequent directors are elected by a majority vote of National's (Points: 4) board of directors. incorporators. officers. shareholders. 44. Bart and Cary are directors of Digital Designs, Inc. Voting by Bart and Cary at corporate directors' meetings (Points: 4) may be cumulative. may be done by proxy in all states. must be done in person. all of the above. 45. Irma, Jim, and Kelly are the directors of Liberty Corporation. Liberty has nine officers and forty-six shareholders. Dividends are ordered by the firm's (Points: 4) board of directors. incorporators. officers. shareholders. 46. Visual Play Company makes DVD players. Visual Play is like most corporations in that its officers are hired by the firm's (Points: 4) board of directors. incorporators. other officers. shareholders. 47. Adam and Beth are officers of Computer Products Corporation. As corporate officers, the rights of Adam and Beth are (Points: 4) determined by their employment contracts. specified in state corporation statutes. the same as those of the directors. the same as those of the shareholders. 48. Applied Innovations, Inc., has thirty-five shareholders. The minimum number that must be present at a meeting for a shareholders' vote is (Points: 4) a proxy. a quorum. eighteen. thirty-five. 49. Tom is a shareholder of United Company. As a shareholder, Tom does not have (Points: 4) a right to compensation. dividend rights. inspection rights. preemptive rights. 50. April owns six 1967 Ford Mustangs in fee simple. April can (Points: 4) use the cars as she chooses, but not dispose of them or transfer them. use or dispose of the cars, but not transfer them. use or transfer the cars, but not otherwise dispose of them. use, transfer, or dispose of the cars, as she chooses.

help please? 32.Long-term growth in production can be explained by a.an improvement in the quality of resources available b.a gradual but consistent rise in the price level c.a rapid and accelerating increase in the price level d.a trade surplus that leads to the accumulation of gold e.the peaks and troughs of economic fluctuations 33."The most important factor in determining a nation's standard of living in the long run is the productivity of its resources." a.True b.False 34.If Q is total real output, K is capital in use, and L is labor employed, the productivity of labor is measured by a.K/L b.L/K c.Q/L d.Q/K e.(Q + K)/L 35.Labor productivity tends to fall as the capital-labor ratio rises. a.True b.False 36.Human capital includes the machinery, equipment and other manufactured creations used to produce goods and services. a.True b.False 37.An example of an increase in human capital would be a.a new machine that humans use to produce more capital b.an increase in wealth c.a more educated labor force d.all of the above e.both a and c 38.Labor productivity is measured as a.the value of total output times total employment b.total output of all workers employed c.total output divided by the number of units of labor employed d.total labor input divided by output e.average output per unit of capital 39.Improvements in technology shift the per-worker production function downward. a.True b.False 40.Which of the following would not increase labor productivity? a.technological change b.an increased amount of capital per unit of labor c.a lower unemployment rate d.greater job experience for the work force e.all of the above increase labor productivity 41.An improvement in the quality of capital would a.rotate the per-worker production function upward b.make the per-worker production function flatter c.shift the per-worker production function downward d.rotate the per-worker production function downward e.have no effect on the per-worker production function 42.Which of the following is most likely to increase productivity growth, as measured using GDP statistics? a.reduced capital formation b.decreased human capital c.increased research and development d.increased government regulation e.higher prices for raw materials 43.The rules of the game refer to a.any factor that facilitates production and exchange b.a gradual but consistent change in the price level until a fair price is attained c.the set of election laws that ensure that all votes are counted in every election d.the requirements place on firms earning a profit e.the requirements that households must provide funding for the investments that firms need to make 44.The rules of the game include all of the following except one. Which is the exception? a.the laws, customs, conventions and other institutional elements associated with trade b.property rights c.ensuring that the market process generates a fair price to all d.a stable political environment e.a stable legal system 45.Which of the following is not be considered a developed country? a.Pakistan b.the United States c.Japan d.Australia e.Belgium 46.Over the last century, U.S. labor productivity has a.fallen b.been constant, on average c.grown at about 2 percent per year d.grown at about 8 percent per year e.grown at about 15 percent per year 47.Productivity growth is important because a.it is the only way an economy can increase GDP b.a small decrease in productivity growth causes a large decline in GDP c.a large increase in productivity growth causes a small decrease in GDP d.it causes an increase in the quantity of all resources available to an economy e.it ultimately increases a nation's standard of living 48.The process of adding more capital per worker is known as "capital deepening." a.True b.False

"When Worlds Collide"........................details given below? In the article “When Worlds Collide” the opinions of three thinkers, Thomas Friedman, John Ralston Saul and Jeffery Sachs, are reviewed. Briefly describe the (3) three different solutions to today’s global inequities offered by Friedman, Saul and Sachs. (Approximate length of answer: 3 Paragraphs) THREE THINKERS OFFER THREE DRASTICALLY DIFFERENT SOLUTIONS TO TODAY'S GLOBAL INEQUITIES The Live 8 concerts, broadcast internationally to an estimated audience of three billion and dedicated to pressuring western political leaders to tackle poverty in Africa, dominated the headlines earlier this summer. For a while at least, the 10 shows, which relied on a global logistics team using advanced telecommunications technology, and on media outlet co-operation worldwide, appeared to strike a chord, and united citizens far and wide to support an undoubtedly important cause. But after the Pet Shop Boys took the stage in Moscow's Red Square, and after crowds swayed to Neil Young in Barrie, Ont., how much was there left to cheer about? Because, although it's easy to agree that ridding the world of poverty is a worthwhile goal, just how to achieve that goal is clearly a much thornier proposition. Against this backdrop, new books from three global thinkers, dedicated to understanding the world we live in and suggesting ways to create a more equitable planet, can be found on store shelves. Their recommendations, not surprisingly, are drastically different. While Thomas Friedman's The World is Flat: A Bnef History of the Twenty-first Century (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, $38.50), suggests that integration is the key to global prosperity, John Ralston Saul argues nearly the opposite in The Collapse of Globalism (Viking Canada, $36), proclaiming the death of globalism as a good thing and reasserting the need for national power. Meanwhile, Jeffrey Sachs's The End of Poverty (Penguin, $40) posits that if rich countries would just increase foreign aid budgets, abject poverty would be eliminated. None of these tomes makes for light summer reading, but the most compelling of the three is Friedman's. In The World is Flat, Friedman, a columnist for The New York Times, argues that, since the fall of the Berlin Wall, geopolitical change and technological innovations like PCs, the Internet and workflow software have resulted in an explosion of creative cross-border businesses and an increasingly "flat" playing field for commercial actors worldwide. Friedman's tidy description of the 10 flattening forces lays the groundwork for a provocative analysis of how America (and, by extension, Canada) can thrive in a world led by companies like HealthScribe India, a Bangalore-based firm that relies on satellites and digitization to provide transcription services for doctors working in the United States. While Friedman seems thoroughly convinced that greater trade and economic integration grows the global pie, upping standards of living everywhere and reducing the chances of war, the challenge lies in reconciling the benefits of a streamlined global marketplace with the immediate chaos that factors like outsourcing can cause locally. In Friedman's eyes, the rise of countries like India and China represents the beginning of an era in which the only way westerners can compete is by turning themselves into "untouchables"-people whose jobs cannot be outsourced. Friedman doesn't suggest the transition to a globalized economy-or a globalized society, for that matter-is straightforward. He acknowledges the difficulties of bridging cultural, political and legal divides, and the fact that, at times, the new world order produces absurd results. case-in-point: in 2003, Tata Consultancy Services Ltd., an Indian consulting firm, won a multimillion-dollar contract to upgrade the claims-processing system of the unemployment department of the state of Indiana. The deal caused an uproar because, while it saved Indiana taxpayers US$8.1 million, it also cost local jobs. A modern conundrum. But Friedman's deep-seated belief that the forces of globalization are both desirable and unstoppable, and that intertwined economies are the great leveller, is a constant. The book's one weakness stems from Friedman's American bias. Despite his admiration for the flat world, he's adamant the U.S. ought to "dominate the twenty-first century the way it dominated the twentieth." But if collaboration is the key, why should anyone dominate? Meanwhile, in The Collapse ofGlobalism, Saul suggests that the trade liberalization mantra has run its course. He doesn't want privatization, deregulation, tax cuts or shrinking governments; nor, according to him, do the scholars and policy-makers who once sang their praises. Apparently awakened to the reality that market reforms alone do not provide peace and prosperity, the governing orthodoxy, he argues, now embraces details like democratic transition and the rule of law. Saul's key frustration is with people and institutions that advise that, as long as the commercial ties between countries are solid, everything else will fall into place. He goes on at some length about the importance of good governance and proposes a heightened focus on public goods as the only way to ensure justice for all. Moreover, Saul disagrees with the sentiment that borders should take a back seat to commerce. He points to recently reborn nation-states like Ukraine, Bulgaria and Latvia, whose people are reluctant to give an ounce of sovereignty over to a global system, and predicts the re-emergence of powerful nation-states as critical to the maintenance of a fair and balanced world. While Friedman and Saul view the world through very different lenses, they hold in common a tendency to focus on the West and BRIG countries (Brazil, Russia, India, China). In Sachs's The End of Poverty, the emphasis is reversed. Here, the American economist, who is also the director of the Earth Institute at Columbia University, focuses on the poorest of the poor, laying out a bold, detailed plan for abolishing extreme global poverty by the year 202 5. Outlining the plight of the 1.1 billion people, most of them in Africa and Asia, who get by on, at most, one dollar a day, Sachs argues that if the wealthy world would pony up between US$135 billion and US$195 billion per year in foreign aid over the next 10 years, and continue giving for 10 years after that, abject poverty would be stamped out. He attributes entrenched poverty to geographical bad luck, poor infrastructure and poor health care, and dismisses corruption or culture as possible culprits. Sachs is a fan of free markets, but he argues that market forces alone are not enough to help, say, an isolated village in Kenya grow out of poverty. He suggests the key is investments in agricultural inputs, basic health, education, power, transportation, safe drinking water and telecommunications. Sachs's experience turning around stumbling economies is impressive. He's not shy about it, either-the first half of the book is an autobiography of sorts, detailing his accomplishments dictating monetary policy and fiscal restraint everywhere from Bolivia to China. Reading Sachs's carefully crafted plans, complete with diagrams and budgets, one wants to have faith in the theory-that if only our political leaders would fork over the cash, poverty could be eradicated. Yet it's hard to believe; the technocratic approach seems at odds with messy reality. Each author calls upon a different set of characters to prove his point. Friedman relies heavily on interviews with businessmen whose cross-border ventures are booming; Saul illustrates his perspective with historical examples and comments from politicians and World Bank types. Sachs, on the other hand, invokes personal anecdotes, academic studies, maps and photographs for impact. Ultimately, it doesn't seem like one book has nailed it. Instead, while addressing the common theme of global inequity, each volume shines a spotlight on a different corner of the complex global landscape. In this case, it's only by considering each approach that a full-colour portrait of our times is revealed, and the need to embrace a variety of strategies in order to set the best course exposed.

How many receipt-less voting machines are used nation-wide?

How many receipt-less voting machines are used nation-wide?

To add to Mr, know it alls question. "what? more problem with evolution?"? The way they used to teach the origin of the species to high school students in this sleepy town of 1,800 people in southern Pennsylvania, said local school board member Angie Yingling disapprovingly, was that "we come from chimpanzees and apes." Not anymore. The school board has ordered that biology teachers at Dover Area High School make students "aware of gaps/problems" in the theory of evolution. Their ninth-grade curriculum now must include the theory of "intelligent design," which posits that life is so complex and elaborate that some greater wisdom has to be behind it. The decision, passed last month by a 6-to-3 vote, makes the 3,600-student school district about 20 miles south of Harrisburg the first in the United States to mandate the teaching of "intelligent design" in public schools, putting it on the front line of the growing national debate over the role of religion in public life. The new curriculum, which prompted two school board members to resign, is expected to take effect in January. The school principal, Joel Riedel, and teachers contacted by The Chronicle refused to comment on the changes. The idea of intelligent design was initiated by a small group of scientists to explain what they believe to be gaps in Charles Darwin's theory of evolution, which they say is "not adequate to explain all natural phenomena. " On an intelligent-design Web site (www.intelligentdesignnetwork.org), the theory is described as "a scientific disagreement with the claim of evolutionary theory that natural phenomena are not designed.'' Critics such as Eugenie Scott, director of the Oakland-based National Center for Science Education, say the Dover school board's decision is part of a growing trend. Religious conservatives, critics say, have been waging a war against Darwin in classrooms since the Scopes "Monkey Trial" of 1925. Tennessee schoolteacher John Scopes was convicted of illegally teaching evolution, but his conviction later was thrown out on a technicality by the Tennessee Supreme Court. "There's a constant impetus by conservative evangelical Christians to bring religion back into the public schools," said Witold Walczak, legal director of the Pennsylvania branch of the American Civil Liberties Union. "The end goal is to get rid of evolution. They view it as a threat to their religion." The intelligent-design theory makes no reference to the Bible, and its proponents do not say who or what the greater force is behind the design. But Yingling, 46, who graduated from Dover High School in 1976, and other supporters of the new curriculum in this religiously conservative slice of rural Pennsylvania say they know exactly who the intelligent designer is. "There's only one creator, and it has to be God," said Rebecca Cashman, 16, a sophomore at Dover High. She frowned when asked to recollect what she learned about evolution at school last year. "Evolution -- is that the Darwin theory?" Cashman shook her head. "I don't know just what he was thinking!" Patricia Nason at the Institute for Creation Research, the world leader in creation science, said her organization and other activist groups are encouraging people who share conservative religious beliefs to seek positions on local school boards. "The movement is to get the truth out," Nason said by telephone from El Cajon (San Diego County). "We Christians have as much right to be involved in politics as evolutionists. We've been asleep for two generations, and it's time for us to come back." Emboldened by their contribution to President Bush's re-election, conservative religious activists are using intelligent design as a new strategy of attacking evolution without mentioning God, Scott said. "There is a new energy as a result of the last election, and I anticipate an even busier couple of years coming on," Scott said. She called intelligent design "creationism lite" masquerading as science. The U.S. Supreme Court in 1987 banned the teaching of creationism -- which holds that God created the world about 6,000 years ago -- in public schools on the grounds of separation of church and state. John West of the Discovery Institute in Seattle, the main sponsor and promoter of intelligent design, defended the theory he says addresses "evolution follies." "Mainstream criticism should be raised in classrooms," West said. The Dover school district's challenge to the primacy of evolution is not isolated. In Cobb County, Ga., parents sued a local school board for mandating that biology textbooks prominently display disclaimers stating that evolution is "not a fact." A federal court is expected to rule next month. In Grantsburg, Wis., a school board revised its science curriculum to teach "various scientific models of theories of origin." In Charles County, Md. , the school board is considering a proposal to eliminate textbooks "biased toward evolution" from classrooms. Similar proposals have been considered this year in Missouri, Mississippi and Oklahoma. "There is nothing random about this," said Barry Lynn, executive director of the Americans United for Separation of Church and State. "You might say it's a planned evolution of an attack on the science of evolution." The drive to bring more religion and what have been labeled "moral values" into the classroom goes beyond challenges to Darwin's theory, Scott said. The Charles County school board also proposed to censor school reading lists of "immorality" or "foul language" and to allow the distribution of Bibles in schools. In Texas, the nation's second-biggest school textbook market, the State Board of Education approved health textbooks that defined abstinence as the only form of contraception and changed the description of marriage between "two people" to "a lifelong union between a husband and a wife." "The religious right has a list of topics that it wants action on," Scott said. "Things like abortion, abstinence, gays are higher up in the food chain of their concern, but evolution is part of the package." This drive has found fertile ground in this part of Pennsylvania, where billboards reading, "Many books inform but only the Bible transforms" line the road, and family restaurants offer free booklets titled "What the Bible says about moral purity" and "The Bible is God's word" at the door. "These brochures give you an idea where some people in this community are coming from," said Jeff Brown, 54, who, along with his wife Carol, 57, resigned from the school board after they voted against changing the biology curriculum. Yingling, who voted in favor, said she believes God created the world in six days and doesn't believe in evolution "at all." Another board member who supported the measure, William Buckingham, refused to say what he believes but has identified himself as a born-again Christian. But religious beliefs or motivations should be beside the point, said Richard Thompson, an attorney who represents the board members. Thompson is the president of the Thomas More Law Center in Ann Arbor, Mich., a pro-bono firm whose Web site promises "the sword and shield for the people of faith." The decision was "supportive of academic freedom more than anything else, " Thompson said. While not talking about his own religious convictions, Thompson added, "When you look at cell structure and you see the intricacy of the cell, you can come to the conclusion that it doesn't happen by natural selection, there has to be intelligent design." Thompson said he is ready to represent the board in the Supreme Court if it comes to that. Some parents and teachers in Dover already have asked the Pennsylvania ACLU to sue the board on their behalf. Walczak said the organization's legal team is studying the case before deciding whether to go to court. Brown, the former school board member, says he is not arguing with other people's religious beliefs. "Don't get me wrong: I don't have a problem with having these booklets where people can pick them up. But I do have a problem with people shoving this down the throats of our children on taxpayers' dollars," Brown said. "I happen to believe both in God and evolution," he said, and his wife nodded: "Hear, hear." The Browns appear to be in the minority. Although public schools have been teaching evolution for decades, a national Gallup poll in November 2004 showed that only 35 percent of those asked believed confidently that Darwin's theory was "supported by the evidence.'' More than one-third of those polled by CBS News later in November said creationism should be taught instead of evolution. "A guy came up to me and said, 'Wait a minute, you believe in God and evolution at the same time? Evolution isn't in the Bible!' " said Brown, nibbling on a deep-fried mozzarella stick at the Shiloh Family Restaurant on Route 74. As he became more agitated, his voice grew louder, and other customers -- mostly gray-haired women and elderly men in baseball hats -- turned their heads to look at the couple. Carol Brown kept putting her index finger to her lips, gesturing for her husband to be quieter. After the Browns left the restaurant, a waitress in her 30s slipped a note to a Chronicle reporter. "Beware," it read. "God wrote over 2,000 years ago that there would be false prophets and teachers. If you would like to know the truth read the Bible." -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Recent actions in the teaching of evolution Tennessee, April 2003: Blount County's Board of Education votes not to adopt three high school biology textbooks because they do not present creationism alongside evolution. California, September 2003: The Board of Trustees of the Roseville Joint Union High School District (Placer County) decide not to enact a district- wide policy on teaching evolution. Science teachers have told the district that they do not want to add anti-evolutionist materials that are not state- approved. Oklahoma, April 2004: Textbook legislation passes after it is stripped of a provision that all textbooks include a disclaimer describing evolution as "a controversial theory which some scientists present as scientific explanation for the origin of living things" and "the unproven belief that random, undirected forces produced a world of living things." Pennsylvania, October 2004: A Dover, Pa., school board votes to include intelligent design in the district's science curriculum, making it the first such school district in the country. Georgia, November 2004: A lawsuit is filed against the Cobb County School District over this disclaimer inserted into textbooks: "This textbook contains material on evolution. Evolution is a theory, not a fact, regarding the origin of living things. This material should be approached with an open mind, studied carefully, and critically considered."

why did Ms. Li Xiaoxi ( Cecilia Lee) from HOK defame EurOrient Financial Group by every possible means ? EurOrient Financial Group: Mr. Nechemia Seeks To Blunt Allegations EurOrient Financial Group (“EurOrient”), a Delaware corporation, is seeking to blunt allegations within libelous articles published on the Internet, (at Yahoo.com and at least on a dozen other Web portals) alleging maladministration by EurOrient and its personnel. EurOrient believes that Ms. Xiaoxi Li, the Marketing Director of Hellmuth, Obata and Kassabaum (“HOK”), based in Beijing, China, is the author of these articles, based upon her own statements made in United States Federal Court. HOK is the U.S.-headquartered architecture, interior design, engineering, planning and consulting firm. As per a statement made by the Board of Directors of EurOrient to the press, “those allegations are outrageous falsehoods and representing an obvious mistreatment and an injustice.” The articles were published after Ms. Xiaoxi Li (who is also known as Ms. Cecilia Lee), Mrs. Xuan K. Le, and Mr. Xiaozhuang Li were named as the prime suspects for breaking into EurOrient corporate property and removing millions of dollars worth of art and antiquities, intellectual properties, and other properties belonging to EurOrient or its subsidiaries. This break-in occurred between July and September 2006 and was uncovered in September 2006. This crime against EurOrient is under investigation by the Los Angeles Police Department, and is considered to be amongst the largest recent art thefts within the United States of America. The articles accuse EurOrient of various acts involving business and financial misconduct, and also accuse Mr. Ron Nechemia, Chairman of the Board of the Directors of EurOrient and the founding father of private sector global development banking, of immoral and unethical practices. In addition, the articles attempt to create a false impression that EurOrient is experiencing serious legal issues before the courts for security violations from a legal action (Corral Vs EurOrient) which was filed against various subsidiaries and affiliates of EurOrient in 2003 and EurOrient was relieved by the Court for failure to show cause (on demurrers). Similarly, the case of Ms. Xuan K. Le Vs EurOrient was successfully defended by EurOrient on October 29, 2007. “Those people that choose to disobey the rule of law and make false allegations set before us the clearest of divides: between those who seek order, and those who spread chaos; between those who work for peaceful change, and those who adopt the methods of gangsters; between those who honor human rights, and those who deliberately take the lives of men, women, and children without mercy or shame”, said Mr. Nechemia, Chairman of the EurOrient Board of Directors. Mr. Nechemia added that “Today humanity struggles against all kinds of terrorism: the struggle against inequality in international economic relations. It is the struggle against ignorance, injustice, discrimination, intolerance, exclusion and poverty. There will be no peace if we do not eradicate these scourges.” The Treasury Board of EurOrient stresses that “the allegations of misconduct and maladministration are serious: they are matters of great and legitimate interest to the public at large in developing countries, to economies in transition, as well as in the United States. They demand a full inquiry that is efficient and comprehensive, yet fair and impartial toward each individual and entity within the scope of the investigation. Our aim is to promptly provide the international community with a full and accurate accounting of what occurred, as well as the results of the investigations or any other action that might be taken. That work must not be impeded.” Further reports will result from any substantive findings on those matters.