Tidbits on April 15, 2005
Bob Jensen at Trinity University 

Fraud Updates --- http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/FraudUpdates.htm
For earlier editions of New Bookmarks go to http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/bookurl.htm 
Archives of Tidbits: Tidbits Directory --- http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/TidbitsDirectory.htm

Click here to search Bob Jensen's web site if you have key words to enter --- Search Site.
For example if you want to know what Jensen documents have the term "Enron" enter the phrase Jensen AND Enron. Another search engine that covers Trinity and other universities is at http://www.searchedu.com/.

Bob Jensen's home page is at http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/

Campaign for Trinity University --- http://www.trinity.edu/departments/public_relations/case_statement/index.htm 

Make her pronounce what you want her to pronounce in 64 languages --- http://vhost.oddcast.com/vhost_minisite/
You can choose wide variations in male or female voices, clothes, hair style, language etc.
I even got her to talk Texan at http://www.oddcast.com/sitepal/   (Click on Try It Now)
She did all right on "Ya'll" and "Fix'in" but she mispronounced "Luchenbach."
(Link forwarded by David Coy)

Jensen Comment:  Any mispronunciations of proper names. may be our own fault.  For example, when I lived in Maine I learned that Mainers pronounce Mt Desert Island like it was French pastry and Calais, Maine like it was a a piece of dry and thorny skin under your big toe.

Today is the April 15 deadline.
Taxpayers filed nearly 56 million returns electronically as of April 8, an 8 percent increase over 2004 figures. That translates to nearly two-thirds of all tax returns, the IRS said. Not only that, Uncle Sam's bean counters expect that this year will mark the first time that more than half of individual tax returns will be filed online. A lot of that is due to the Free File software, which the IRS said accepted more than 4 million tax returns as of April 6, an almost 45 percent increase over the number filed last year.
Robert MacMillan, "E-Filing Clicks With Taxpayers," Washington Post, April 14, 2005 --- http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A52797-2005Apr14.html?referrer=email
Jensen Comment:  Free tax filing software is now available at http://www.irs.gov/efile/article/0,,id=118986,00.html
The IRS warns against filing electronically very late in the day on April 15.  The lines could be jammed and you may not get through.

Pope fraud
In the greedy world of spam e-mail and electronic fraud, nothing is sacred - not even the death of Pope John Paul II.  Spammers are using the pope's passing to entice the Roman Catholic faithful worldwide into a bogus moneymaking scheme by luring them with an offer of free books about the pontiff, a British-based computer security expert warned Tuesday. The spam campaign was detected Friday - the day John Paul was laid to rest after a funeral that drew dozens of world leaders and hundreds of thousands of pilgrims - said Graham Cluley, a senior technology consultant with London's SophosLabs PLC.
"Spammers Using Pope's Image to Defraud," iWon News, April 12, 2005 --- http://apnews1.iwon.com/article/20050412/D89E07K80.html

Two very funny fake papers
MIT's Technology Review, April 11, 2005 ---
http://www.technologyreview.com/blog/blog.asp?blogID=1793&trk=nl

This one is, well, . . . a fake
A "scientific paper" was authored by a computer and accepted by one of those "fakey" conferences
SCIgen is a program that generates random Computer Science research papers, including graphs, figures, and citations. It uses a hand-written context-free grammar to form all elements of the papers. Our aim here is to maximize amusement, rather than coherence. One useful purpose for such a program is to auto-generate submissions to "fake" conferences; that is, conferences with no quality standards, which exist only to make money. A prime example, which you may recognize from spam in your inbox, is SCI/IIIS and its dozens of co-located conferences (for example, check out the gibberish on the WMSCI 2005 website). Using SCIgen to generate submissions for conferences like this gives us pleasure to no end. In fact, one of our papers was accepted to SCI 2005!
Nick Danger, "Randomly-Generated Scientific Paper Accepted by Conference MIT Computer Science Department ," Free Republic,  http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1383008/posts
Jensen Comment"  "Fake conferences" are often used to enrich conference organizers at the expense of colleges who fund travel expenses for professors.

This site is full of facts on about the decline in teen pregnancies --- http://www.teenpregnancy.org/whycare/whatif.asp

April 11, 2005 message from William H Wallace [whwnbt@RIT.EDU]

For those who are interested in an Accounting group that focuses on teaching rather than research, may I suggest that you investigate www.TACTYC.org

It is the website for the Teachers of Accounting at Two-Year College (TACTYC). As the former president and an Accounting teacher at the two-year level, I clearly have a preference for a group that focuses on teaching and keeping faculty up to date at a reasonable cost. I invite you to give us a look.

William H. Wallace CPA
Associate Professor
National Technical Institute for the Deaf

Creationists aren't going to like this one
"LEGACY FOR THE HUMAN SPECIES."  Now everybody else has a chance to trace their roots -- and perhaps get a surprise like D'Onofrio's. Using a kit that can be purchased for $99.95, plus shipping and handling, online, you collect a sample of cells scraped from the inside of your mouth and send it in. You may then view the results of the analysis later on the Web site. As more people send in their specimens, an ever-richer picture of our collective past will come to light. Those who check back regularly over the years will get an increasingly detailed map of their genetic roots.
The project emerged out of Wells' work as a real-life Indiana Jones. The anthropologist and geneticist does plenty of research in remote locations. Even when he's back home, he dresses as if he's about to go trekking -- in flannel shirts, jeans, and field boots. He has spent much of the past decade tracing our common lineage back to an "Eve" who lived in Africa 80,000 years ago, and an "Adam" who lived there 20,000 years later. He published the story two years ago in the book Journey of Man: A Genetic Odyssey, which was also made into a documentary movie.
Steve Hamm, "Tracing Humanity's Genetic Roots:  The Genographic Project, a National Geographic Society-IBM alliance, is the first to map our ancestors' migration, using cells the public submits," Business Week, April 13, 2005 --- http://www.businessweek.com/bwdaily/dnflash/apr2005/nf20050413_6564_db016.htm

Full-body condom sometimes is not sufficient protection
On March 1, colleagues of French financier Edouard Stern found their boss lying dead in a pool of blood in the bedroom of his Geneva apartment, clad head-to-toe in a skin-colored, latex bodysuit. There were two bullets in his head and one in his chest. The murder of one of Europe's richest men sent a shudder through the world of global finance. Mr. Stern was the dashing heir of a 19th-century banking dynasty. He was also a shrewd businessman whose ruthlessness over the years had earned him many enemies. Swiss police quickly cleared up part of the mystery: Mr. Stern's lover, a 36-year-old woman named Cecile Brossard, confessed to murdering him. But investigators say they don't have a clear picture of her motive . . . A different lawyer for Ms. Brossard says his client committed a "crime of passion." Under Swiss law, that carries a shorter prison sentence than premeditated murder. Ms. Brossard portrays herself as a victim of Mr. Stern's abusive behavior, someone who lost control in a moment of fury and grabbed the gun her lover kept in a drawer. For example, she says through her attorney, Mr. Stern would often promise to marry her and then renege.
John Carreyrou, Jo Wrighton, and Alessandra Galloni, "How Banker's Life, Full of Intrigue, Ended in Murder:  Monied Scion Edouard Stern Riled France's Old Guard; Then He Met Ms. Brossard Dispute Over Eight Chagalls," The Wall Street Journal,  April 14, 2005; Page A1 --- http://online.wsj.com/article/0,,SB111343050917906363,00.html?mod=todays_us_page_one

A new meaning to the phrase "closet case"
A man who secretly lived in a closet at the home of his married girlfriend for a month was charged Tuesday with beating her husband to death after the man discovered him sleeping in the storage area.  Nashville police spokesman Don Aaron said Rafael DeJesus Rocha-Perez of Murfreesboro, Tenn., was charged with criminal homicide in the beating death of Jeffrey A. Freeman, 44, and ordered held on $500,000 bail. "From time to time, you come across a case with very unique — even bizarre — circumstances," Aaron said. "This one probably rates right up there with them."
"Lover in closet charged with killing cuckold Wife hid paramour for month before fatal encounter, police say," MSNBC, April 13, 2005 --- http://msnbc.msn.com/id/7479996/

Fees for your personal 800 number
Consider an 800 number for the family. These services have been around for years, but often with exorbitant per-minute charges. Now prices are dropping, though they can still add up. Kall8, an add-on to your regular phone service, costs $2 to set up and $2 a month; most incoming calls are 6.9 cents a minute. Though the monthly fees are often higher, traditional phone carriers offer the service too. AT&T and SBC charge $2.95 a month; AT&T calls are 15 cents a minute and SBC's per-minute price is a dime; neither charges a setup fee. Even Internet-calling companies now have the service. Vonage, for example, levies a $9.99 setup fee and $4.99 per month, for 100 minutes of calls. Such providers can be attractive for heavy users.
"Getting an 800 Number," The Wall Street Journal, April 12, 2005; Page D1 --- http://online.wsj.com/article/0,,SB111326784334404213,00.html?mod=todays_us_personal_journal

The law is not deterring attacks of some free speech on college campuses
Last October, two liberals responded to my speech at the University of Arizona – during question and answer, no less – by charging the stage and throwing two pies at me from a few yards away. Fortunately for me, liberals not only argue like liberals, they also throw like girls. (Apologies in advance to the Harvard biology professors who walked out on Larry Summers in a demonstration of their admiration of "research," not "revelation" – but this may account for the dearth of female pitchers in Major League Baseball.) Unfortunately for them, Republican men don't react favorably to two "Deliverance" boys trying to sucker-punch a 110-pound female in a skirt and heels. The geniuses ended up with bloody noses and broken bones. It's really outrageous how conservatives respond to liberals who are just trying to engage in a "fact-driven debate." How typical of Republicans to go on the offensive just because a female has been physically attacked. Instead of capturing and subduing my attackers, those strong Republican men should have been trying to understand why they threw the pies. In the five months following the liberal ass-whupping in Arizona – I mean "fact-driven debate" – all was quiet on the Eastern Front. College liberals still couldn't formulate a coherent argument, but they seemed to want to avoid ending up in jail having to explain to their cellmates that they were in for trying to hit a girl (and missing). Then on March 19, all charges were dismissed against the "Deliverance" boys – including a felony charge for $3,000 worth of damage to school property. Inexplicably, this outcome did not instantly lead to widespread rioting and looting in South Central Los Angeles. Democrat Barbara LaWall is the Pima County attorney who allowed the liberal debate champions to walk. LaWall brags on her website about "holding criminals accountable." She didn't say anything about liberals, however. Be forewarned, conservatives: Do not expect the law to protect you in Pima County. In the three weeks following the dismissal of all charges against my attackers, three more conservatives were attacked on college campuses.
Ann Coulter, "It's Only Funny Until Someone Loses a Pie," Front Page Magazine, April 14, 2005 --- http://www.frontpagemagazine.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=17711

Kidney Disease and Treatment
About half of the more than 60,000 people on the waiting list for kidney transplants are age 50 or older. Most transplant recipients typically are younger than 70, but there are numerous cases of older patients receiving a successful kidney transplant. Age policies vary by transplant centers, and some have an age cutoff. Typically, the patient's overall health and the likelihood of a successful transplant are the most important factors in deciding whether a patient is a transplant candidate. In March, researchers from Wake Forest University Baptist Medical Center presented new research supporting the idea that age alone shouldn't prevent older adults from having a kidney transplant nor should it prevent someone from donating a kidney. A study of 144 kidney transplants found that a year after surgery survival rates were comparable -- 98% for younger patients and 92% for patients older than 60.
Tara Parker-Pope, "Health Mailbox," The Wall Street Journal, April 12, 2005, Page D4 --- http://online.wsj.com/article/0,,SB111325649364303940,00.html?mod=todays_us_personal_journal

Hives
In the majority of cases, the cause of hives cannot be determined. Typically, a doctor will prescribe allergy medications, antihistamines or steroid treatments. The drugs often will relieve the symptom, and the hives disappear in a matter of days or weeks. Sometimes hives are an allergic reaction to drugs such as antibiotics or aspirin, or to foods such as shellfish, nuts or strawberries -- even if the person has taken them before without a problem. Sometimes a more serious health problem can trigger hives, including sinus and urinary-tract infections, candida infections, thyroid disease, lymphoma and lupus. If the problem persists, your doctor may want to rule out some of these more serious conditions.
Tara Parker-Pope, "Health Mailbox," The Wall Street Journal, April 12, 2005, Page D4 --- http://online.wsj.com/article/0,,SB111325649364303940,00.html?mod=todays_us_personal_journal

Merchants Balk At Higher Fees For Credit Cards
As a result, a backlash is brewing among small-business owners who say they are hurt by the fee creep more than bigger merchants. To fight back, the owners of 30 Minute Photos, for instance, e-mailed a letter to 25,000 customers on March 31, asking them to contact their charge-card providers to justify the fee increase. "This is another one of those opportunities for credit-card companies to enhance their revenue stream on the backs of merchants," says Mitchell Goldstone, co-owner of the Irvine, Calif.-based photo-developing retailer that also operates a national online photo service.
Gwendolyn Bounds and Robin Sidel, "Merchants Balk At Higher Fees For Credit Cards" The Wall Street Journal, April 12, 2005; Page B1 ---
http://online.wsj.com/article/0,,SB111326429930704091,00.html?mod=todays_us_marketplace
Bob Jensen's threads on dirty secrets of credit card companies are at http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/FraudReporting.htm#FICO

This comes as no surprise:  Charity has always afforded scam opportunities
The tax laws allow favorable treatment for donations to charity and for institutions ostensibly dedicated to good works. But for every tax break that's legal, there's a scheme to stretch it too far. Abuse in the charitable world is on the rise, IRS Commissioner Mark Everson told the Senate last week. Charitable scams account for part of the billions lost each year in fraudulent deductions, though the IRS can't say exactly how much. The Senate Finance Committee is looking into the abuses, which include people who take inflated deductions for dubious gifts and foundations that squander money on lavish salaries. In either case, the federal treasury is cheated, and other taxpayers must make up the losses. Such charitable scamming turns tax laws on their head: Deductions meant to encourage public good works are being hijacked by cheaters for their own benefit. Leaders in the non-profit world should be the toughest on these scams, which at times have soured the public on giving. Instead, they've acted only after Congress pushed them and have called for only milquetoast reforms.
"As charitable cheating rises, so does cost to taxpayers Non-profits fail to enact tough reforms to root out growing scams," USA Today, April 11, 2005, Page 12A --- http://www.usatoday.com/printedition/news/20050411/edit11.art.htm

Profiteers Heading Legitimate Charities
Charity executives haul home the lion's share striking disparity between what nonprofit fat cats make and industry norms — hundreds of thousands of dollars in many cases — illustrates a troubling lack of city oversight, officials say.  A whopping 200 executives at organizations that provide services for the city's have-nots take home in excess of $150,000 a year. That's more than the salaries of City Council members, the public advocate and all the city's district attorneys.  Another 12 nonprofiteers make more than the top nonprofit earners in the entire state based on the budget size of their groups, according to a survey of 2002 salaries by the nonprofit watchdog Guidestar.org.
"$WEET CHARITY FOR EXECS AT NONPROFITS," New York Post, March 13, 2005 --- http://www.nypost.com/news/regionalnews/42413.htm 

Bob Jensen's threads on charity scams are at http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/FraudReporting.htm#CharityFrauds

Community colleges are stuffed and overflowing
For community colleges, turning away qualified students isn’t just something they don’t want to do, it goes against their entire philosophy. But in the hallways and in sessions at the annual meeting of the American Association of Community Colleges, which convened over the weekend in Boston, leaders of two-year institutions talked about their frustrations with capacity issues. As states have cut funds or failed to keep up with enrollment growth, de facto enrollment limits have been set — and students are being turned away.
Scott Jaschik, "At Capacity," Inside Higher Ed, April 11, 2005 --- http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2005/04/11/aacc

Google Versus the Librarians
“The war is over, and Google won,” said Richard Sweeney, university librarian at the New Jersey Institute of Technology and a proud Googlelizer. He and Judy Luther, a consultant on library technology issues, both praised Google for making information more accessible to a much broader range of users. Sweeney compared searching in Google to the kind of video and other gaming that many young people do, where once a user achieves a certain level of success, “you can move on to the next level." By offering simple and advanced searching, Luther said, Google makes users, particularly young ones, feel “like they’re in control” and encourages them to do searches and get results.” Academic librarians, she said, “can build upon that” over time to transform those young people into consumers of what the libraries have to offer. She, too, drew a parallel to gaming, in which players typically try to “get around” those in positions of responsibility and lean heavily on their “strategy coaches.”
Doub Lederman, "Google: Friend or Foe?" Inside Higher Ed, April 11, 2005 --- http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2005/04/11/google

Being gay does not necessarily equate to being liberal:  Some prominent conservatives are openly or privately gay
Arthur J. Finkelstein, a prominent Republican consultant who has directed a series of hard-edged political campaigns to elect conservatives in the United States and Israel over the last 25 years, said Friday that he had married his male partner in a civil ceremony at his home in Massachusetts.
Adam Nagourney, "G.O.P. Consultant Weds His Male Partner," The New York Times, April 10, 2005 --- http://snipurl.com/NYTApr10

The media seems less interested in Fannie than Enron.  Did you ever wonder why?
It’s a familiar story. An enormous company reveals its “accounting problems.” The problems are found to be far worse than anyone realized. The CEO is forced to resign. Other high-ranking executives follow. The stock price begins to drop. Billions of dollars might be lost. The politically savvy CEO even has direct connections to a presidential administration. If the word “Enron” has formed in your mind, you’d be close, but wrong. Welcome to Fannie Mae, the nation’s second-largest financial company. Only Fannie Mae, officially known as the Federal National Mortgage Association, isn’t like any standard Wall Street business. It was founded by Congress to increase the amount of capital available for the secondary mortgage market. Fannie Mae is a Government Sponsored Entity (GSE) and enjoys a congressional charter, limited oversight, and a strongly implied government commitment to cover any losses. This billion-dollar scandal has highlighted questionable practices by the lender and the response from America’s broadcast media has been almost complete silence.
Dan Gainor and Charles Simpson "Government-Sponsored Enron Billion-Dollar Scandal Not Ready for Prime Time," Free Market Project, April 4, 2005 --- http://www.freemarketproject.org/specialreports/2005/fannie_mae/fannie_mae.asp
Bob Jensen's threads on Fannie and Freddie are at http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/caseans/000index.htm 

http://online.wsj.com/article/0,,SB111318529262503191,00.html?mod=todays_us_opinion

A Foray Into Gay and Lesbian Networks
We are not out at bars cruising for anonymous sex," he said. "We are generally at home with our partners, taking care of a leaking roof and transporting the cat to the vet because she is coughing. What the gay community lacks is the same type of general entertainment that everybody else has." The gay, bisexual and transsexual communities are about to get a large supply of that programming. Viacom, the nation's largest owner of cable networks, is finally set to start Logo, its own advertiser-supported network aimed at the same market. The debut, originally scheduled for mid-February, is now set for June 30.
Geraldine Fabrikant, "A Foray Into Gay and Lesbian Networks," The New York Times, April 11, 2005 --- http://www.nytimes.com/2005/04/11/business/media/11gay.html?

See evil, blog no evil:  You can attend the hearing but you're not supposed to blog about it afterwards
Canada's long-standing practice of barring news organizations from disclosing what's happening in certain court proceedings is being tested by Internet bloggers.  A Canadian commission that's investigating charges of high-level wrongdoing in the nation's Liberal Party has ordered news organizations not to reveal details from the proceedings, which are open to the public.  But Ed Morrissey, a conservative Web logger in Minneapolis, has been gleefully violating the ban by posting detailed reports of the verboten "Adscam" testimony. Public revelation of Adscam, which involves allegations of corruption and illegal campaign contributions, could end the Liberal Party's precarious grasp on power and force new elections this summer.
Declan McCullagh , "U.S. blogger thwarts Canadian gag order," CNet News, April 5, 2005 --- http://news.com.com/U.S.+blogger+thwarts+Canadian+gag+order/2100-1028_3-5656087.html?tag=nefd.ac

Difficult times for auditors to claim financial statement audits should not uncover massive fraud
HealthSouth Corp. has filed suit accusing its former outside auditor, Ernst & Young, of intentionally or negligently failing to uncover a massive accounting fraud at the medical services chain.
"HealthSouth Sues Ernst & Young for Fraud," SmartPros, April 6, 2005 --- http://accounting.smartpros.com/x47712.xml
Bob Jensen's threads on E&Y's legal woes are at http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/fraud001.htm#Ernst

When Smith Barney talked, the NASD was listening!
It's always serious when the NASD takes action, because the NASD tends to protect its broker members
Citigroup Inc.'s Smith Barney unit expressed disappointment with an arbitration ruling awarding $2.5 million to an investor who alleged he received bad stock-option advice from brokers in Citigroup's Smith Barney branch in Atlanta. Smith Barney spokeswoman Kimberly Atwater said the company was "disappointed with this decision, which is inconsistent with those made in other cases." Virginia resident Travis Brown claimed during the National Association of Securities Dealers hearing that the brokers advised him to use an "exercise and hold" strategy with his WorldCom stock options from 1999 to 2000. Mr. Brown's account lost value as WorldCom's stock price began to tumble in 2000.
"Ruling Disappoints Smith Barney," The Wall Street Journal, April 12, 2005; Page A6 --- http://online.wsj.com/article/0,,SB111327048205304284,00.html?mod=todays_us_page_one
Bob Jensen's threads on "Rotten to the Core" are at http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/FraudRotten.htm

What the people want is very simple - they want an America as good as its promise.
Barbara Jordan

Political scientist Stephen Zunes says most governments have double standards when it comes to foreign policy. This is nothing new. But then, he adds, most governments aren't presenting themselves as paragons of democracy the way the United States does. And that has led to unprecedented national security risks, as other nations increasingly regard the United States with hostility because it seems the world's most powerful nation isn't willing to hold itself to the standards it expects of others, Zunes said. "If we refuse to play by the rules, why should anyone else?" Zunes asked. The rhetorical question was central to the keynote talk Zunes, a professor of politics and chairman of the Peace and Justice Studies program at the University of San Francisco, gave during Saturday's Anti-War Educational Conference at the Salt Lake City Main Library. Sponsored by the Wasatch Coalition for Peace and Justice and the Utah Green Party, the talk drew about 50 people.
Patty Henetz, "U.S. gives democracy a bad name, speaker says." The Salt Lake Tribune, April 10, 2005 --- http://www.sltrib.com/utah/ci_2648348

Seems like she gives the finger a bit too often
The woman who claims she bit into a human finger while eating chili at a Wendy's restaurant has a history of filing lawsuits - including a claim against another fast-food restaurant. Anna Ayala, 39, who hired a San Jose, Calif., attorney to represent her in the Wendy's case, has been involved in at least half a dozen legal battles in the San Francisco Bay area, according to court records. She brought a suit against an ex-boss in 1998 for sexual harassment and sued an auto dealership in 2000, alleging the wheel fell off her car. That suit was dismissed after Ayala fired her lawyer, who said she had threatened him. The case against her former employer was settled in arbitration in June 2002, but it was not known whether she received any money. Speaking through the front door of her Las Vegas home Friday, Ayala claimed police are out to get her and were unnecessarily rough as they executed a search warrant at her home on Wednesday . . . Ayala acknowledged, however, that her family received a settlement for their medical expenses about a year ago after reporting that her daughter, Genesis, got sick from food at an El Pollo Loco restaurant in Las Vegas. She declined to provide any further details.
"Woman Claiming Finger in Chili Sues Often," MyWay, April 8, 2005 --- http://apnews.myway.com/article/20050409/D89BJV380.html

Reports of a severed human finger in a bowl of chili at a Wendy's restaurant have hit the firm's sales in the San Francisco area, a company spokesman said. "We've had a severe sales impact from this, particularly in the San Francisco-San Jose bay area," said spokesman Bob Bertini from Wendy's corporate headquarters in Dublin, Ohio on Saturday. "It's very important to us to find out what happened in this incident. We believe someone knows exactly how the piece of finger got into the chili bowl," he said. The company has offered a $US50,000 ($65,000) reward to the first person offering verifiable information about how the finger found its way into a bowl of chili at a Wendy's franchise in San Jose.
"Finger report hits Wendy's sales," Sydney Morning Herald, April 11, 2005 --- http://www.smh.com.au/text/articles/2005/04/10/1113071854936.html

Sounds good, but there are well known dangers
For years, a company's highest boss often got rewarded very well for very little performance. Now, in response to a growing outcry from investors -- and their increased clout -- more boards are raising the bar even higher so their leader can't reap supersized pay without supersized performance. Hints of the nascent trend include: bonuses partly based on how a company stacks up against others; difficult triggers for all equity awards; elimination of guaranteed minimum pay; and severance accords that forbid windfalls for poor performance.
Joann S. Lublin, "Goodbye to Pay for No Performance," The Wall Street Journal, April 11, 2005, Page R1 --- http://online.wsj.com/article/0,,SB111265005063397590,00.html?mod=todays_us_the_journal_report
Jensen Comment:  Much depends upon how "performance" is evaluated.  If it is based on trends in annual earnings this can be a formula for disaster.  A CEO wanting the highest current bonus available can "eat the company's seed corn" so to speak.  Some items of expense, R&D comes to mind reap a harvest in future years rather than current years.  It is well known that the CEOs of many companies are willing to hurt the future in order to get their current bonuses and other performance-based compensation short-term rewards.

Here come the lawsuits under the Americans With Disabilities Act
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit ruled this week that the 11th Amendment does not protect public colleges from lawsuits filed by students under the Americans With Disabilities Act. The 11th circuit’s decision overturned a lower federal court’s 2001 ruling in a lawsuit brought against Florida International University by a group of hearing impaired students. They contended that the state-funded university had violated the ADA by failing to provide qualified classroom interpreters or note takers or to offer other ways for such students to understand classroom instruction.
Doug Lederman, "Less Immunity for Public Colleges?" Inside Higher Ed, April 8, 2005 --- http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2005/04/08/disabled

What Makes Google Click?
Have investors lost their minds? The dot-com bust proves this is entirely possible. But the case for the Google boom is that this isn't advertising of the old kind; it's a reinvention of the business. Old advertising was predatory, militaristic almost: There were "campaigns" to "target" passive consumers; the objective was to score "hits" on them. Googletising is an altogether gentler art. Ads aren't directed at consumers. They are directed by them. To understand this change, remember that the early Internet ventures attempted no such revolution. America Online and its competitors -- such as Microsoft's MSN -- embraced the business model of television and the print media: Lure customers with news and entertainment; do everything possible to keep them on your own pages; sell advertising space that's priced according to how many eyes will see it. This model encouraged advertising that clamored rudely for consumers' attention -- banner ads equipped with catchy tunes, videos that pull your eyes away from static text and those infuriating pop-ups.
Sebastian Mallaby, "What Makes Google Click," Washington Post, April 11, 2005 --- http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A42690-2005Apr10.html?referrer=email

Nobody defends this type of journalism fraud
Mitch Albom, one of Detroit's most prominent figures, is a one-man multimedia entity as a nationally known sports columnist, radio and TV personality, best-selling author and playwright. He added another role this week--one no journalist wants. Albom is making news rather than reporting it, under suspension from the Detroit Free Press until the newspaper completes an investigation of a fabrication in an Albom column that ran last Sunday. Reaction in the journalism community, from columnist peers to college instructors, ranged from harsh to empathetic. But no one excused or forgave Albom's or his copy editors' errors in judgment. And no one dismissed those mistakes as insignificant.
Michael Hersley, "No one's defending renowned journalist Peers, educators critical of Detroit's Mitch Albom for reporting something that didn't happen," Chicago Tribune, April 10, 2005 --- http://www.chicagotribune.com/sports/chi-0504100370apr10,1,5217277.story?ctrack=1&cset=true

I hope this becomes reality before cell phone conversations are allowed in flight
If researchers at the DARPA, the US Department of Defense's research agency is to be believed, people could soon be having conversations on their mobile phones, but without uttering a sound. The agency, is working on a project known as Advanced Speech Encoding, aimed at replacing microphones with non-acoustic sensors that detect speech via the speaker's nerve and muscle activity, rather than sound itself.
"Soon you can talk on your mobile without uttering a word!" Web India, April 8, 2005 --- http://www.webindia123.com/news/showdetails.asp?id=76497&cat=Science

New money often equates to new fraud
It was a signature plan of Bill Clinton's presidency: Attack the rising crime rates of the early 1990s by putting 100,000 more cops on America's streets. Ten years later, the grant program known as COPS (for Community Oriented Policing Services) has given $10 billion to help more than 12,000 police agencies hire and reassign officers. Politicians and police chiefs across the nation have said that COPS is a big reason for the sharp decline in crime rates that began in the late 1990s. But now, with the largest buildup of local law enforcement in U.S. history winding down, a lessflattering view of the COPS program is emerging: Federal audits of just 3% of all COPS grants have alleged that $277 million was misspent. Tens of thousands of jobs funded by the grants were never filled, or weren't filled for long, auditors found. And there's little evidence that COPS was a big factor in reducing crime.
Peter Eisler and Kevin Johnson, "10 years and $10B later, COPS drawing scrutiny Auditors find abuses, fraud in federal program," USA Today, April 11, 2005 --- http://www.usatoday.com/printedition/news/20050411/copscover.art.htm

If he didn't feel up to it he could've at least acknowledged his two invitations
We've learned from a source in a position to know (but not willing to be identified) that Mr. Carter was actually offered a seat in the delegation "twice," but turned it down both times. This wouldn't be the first time Mr. Carter has snubbed this President Bush. In 2002, he eagerly collected a Nobel Peace Prize awarded in a clear attempt to discredit the then-looming Iraq war. Nor would it be the first time he snubbed the papacy. Two popes died on President Carter's watch but he dispatched his wife to one funeral and his mother to the other. At the time, some criticized Mr. Carter for missing an opportunity to disavow lingering anti-Catholic bigotry in the evangelical circles from which he sprang. At 80, Mr. Carter can't be blamed if he just didn't feel up to the hurly-burly of a papal funeral with two million other attendees. It would have been better just to say so, however, instead of adopting a martyr pose and feeding an unnecessary and unflattering controversy
Brendan Miniter, Notable and Quotable, The Wall Street Journal, April 11, 2005 --- http://online.wsj.com/article/0,,SB111317354767802992,00.html?mod=opinion&ojcontent=otep

Flashback
The Wall Street Journal, April 12, 1963
The FCC, in collaboration with the Justice Department, has proposed a tight new set of rules to halt what it terms "a significant increase in the broadcast of horse racing information." An exception would permit broadcasting the Kentucky Derby...

Forwarded by Barb Hessel

Brand New 2005 Edition Of "You Know You're A Redneck When..."

1. You take your dog for a walk and you both use the same tree.

2. You can entertain yourself for more than 15 minutes with a fly swatter.

3. Your boat has not left the driveway in 15 years.

4. You burn your yard rather than mow it.

5. You think the "Nutcracker" is something you do off the high dive.

6. The Salvation Army declines your furniture.

7. You offer to give someone the shirt off your back and they don't want it.

8. You have the local taxidermist on speed dial.

9. You come back from the dump with more than you took there.

10. You keep a can of Raid on the kitchen table.

11. Your wife can climb a tree faster than your cat.

12. Your grandmother has "ammo" on her Christmas list.

13. You keep flea and tick soap in the shower.

14. You've been involved in a custody fight over a hunting dog.

15. You go to the stock car races and don't need a program! .

16. You know how many bales of hay your car will hold.

17. You have a rag for a gas cap.

18. Your house doesn't have curtains, but ! your truck does.

19. You wonder how service stations keep their restrooms so clean.

20. You can spit without opening your mouth.

21. You consider your license plate as personalized because your father made it.

22. Your lifetime ! goal is to own a fireworks stand.

23. You have a complete set of salad bowls and they all say "Cool Whip" on the side.

24. The biggest city you've ever been to is WalMart.

25. Your working TV sits on top of your non-working TV.

26. You've used your ironing board as a buffet table.

27. A tornado hits your neighborhood and does a $100,000.00 worth of improvements.

28. You use a toilet brush to scratch your back.

29. You missed your 5th grade graduation because you were on jury duty

30. You think fast food is hitting a deer at 85 mph.

And Last, But Not Least...

31. Someone tells you that you've got something in your teeth, so you take them out to see what it is!

Fraud Updates --- http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/FraudUpdates.htm
For earlier editions of New Bookmark s go to http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/bookurl.htm 
Archives of Tidbits: Tidbits Directory --- http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/TidbitsDirectory.htm

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Professor Robert E. Jensen (Bob) http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen
Jesse H. Jones Distinguished Professor of Business Administration
Trinity University, San Antonio, TX 78212-7200
Voice: 210-999-7347 Fax: 210-999-8134  Email:  rjensen@trinity.edu