1
POPSLucky Wang 24-year-old fashion favorite Alexander Wang won $200,000 and a years worth of mentoring from the CFDA/Vogue fashion fund last night. Check out our story on fashion's angels: http://www.forbes.com/2007/08/30/style-sponsors-designers-forbeslife-cx_ls_0831fashionpak.html
3
POPSTough Times: Congress Grew 13 Percent Richer In 2007
Rep Robin Hayes, R-N.C., ranks third, with $173.4 million. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., ranks sixth, with $62 million. In the Senate, the two Democrats from Massachusetts claimed two of the top three spots. Sen. John Kerry led the pack, with $336 million, while Sen. Edward M. Kennedy ranked third, with $104 million. Sen. Herb Kohl, D-Wis., ranked second, with $241.5 million. Overall, senators had a median net worth estimated at $1.7 million. The 535 members of Congress, who earn average annual salaries of $169,000 and receive cost-of-living pay increases, had a total net worth of $3.7 billion last year. Although some are likely to take a hit from Wall Street's woes, their average net worth soared by 61 percent from 2004 to 2007. Obama ranked as one of the biggest financial winners, with his net worth increasing from $800,000 in 2006 to $4.7 million last year McCain estimated at $28.5 million wealth attributed to his wife Cindy's family fortune.
33
POPS10 Most Brilliant Gadgets Of 2008 Popular Mechanics announced its picks for the 2008 Breakthrough Awards awards in what the publication called The 10 Most Brilliant Gadets of the Year. Here's the list of international winners; you may be surprised at the gadgets on the list.
1
POPS Obama vs. Pelosi Barack Obama obviously has thought carefully about mistakes made by previous Democratic presidential winners who wrongly believed a Congress controlled by their own party would help make them a success. That may be one reason why Mr. Obama has chosen Rahm Emanuel, a respected member of the Congressional leadership, to become his new White House Chief of Staff. Mr. Emanuel has a reputation as a tough partisan, but he has also exhibited impatience with left-wing members of his party who have overly ambitious ideological agendas. To the extent Mr. Obama becomes a successful president, it will be because he remains his own man and trusts the brilliant political instincts that have gotten him this far, this fast.
4
POPSThe Reign of Lame Falls Mainly on McCain The winner is Obama because now he can start hanging out in public with Bill Ayers and Rev. Jeremiah Wright again. John McCain is a winner because he can resume buying more houses. And for only the second time in her adult life, Michelle Obama was proud of her country. And we're all winners because we will never again have to hear McCain say, "my friends." After Bill Clinton won the 1992 presidential election, Hillary Clinton immediately announced that, henceforth, she would be known as "Hillary Rodham Clinton." So maybe Obama can now become B. Hussein Obama, his rightful name. For now, we have a new president-elect. In the spirit of reaching across the aisle, we owe it to the Democrats to show their president the exact same kind of respect and loyalty that they have shown our recent Republican president. Starting tomorrow, if not sooner.
4
POPSIraqi War: Winners and Losers American and British corporations like Haliburton, KBR, AMEC, Aegis, Erinys, and others in Iraq have come out as the biggest winners. Iraqi civilians didn't have a chance. Not news but still the graphic is disturbing.
1
POPSInspiration in trying times As Wall Street continues to get slammed today, this is worth a read. Our financial system may be shaken but entrepreneurs are continuing to invent and change the game of nearly every imaginable industry. All of the businesses the WSJ highlights are exciting ones.
1
POPSAlysheba Returns From Saudi Arabia To Reside At Horse Park He will reside in the Hall of Champions at the Kentucky Horse Park. Alysheba, who was known on the track as "America's horse," has spent the last eight years in the royal stables of HRH King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia, after standing his first years at stud at William S. Farish's Lane's End Farm in Versailles, Ky. He will soon arrive back home on his native soil thanks to the king, who is sending Alysheba to the Kentucky Horse Park as a gift to the American people. "Shipping a 24-year-old horse is not without risk so we had to take every precaution to ensure that the process was stress free. Alysheba's comfort and safety were of such importance to the king that his two-month pre-export quarantine was spent in the luxury of the ultra-modern Nad Al Sheba Quarantine Centre in Dubai. We are very thankful to the Nad Al Sheba Quarantine team for the care and attention that they gave Alysheba during his stay there."
4
POPSPhase I - Herr Obama's National Socialist Party Heil Obama. Sieg Heil! Der Fuhrer is preparing to institute National Socialism in our country. The first step is wealth redistribution. The next step will be purging of those who disagree with His dogma. Next come the black gestapo.
4
POPSCola, stale chip research win win Ig Nobels What they found about the mechanism of sperm and aids killing makes me wonder if cola can be used on other micro organisms like MRSA. The sperm in the sugar, no doubt with the chemicals in cola acting as a catalyst, cause them to 'Eat themselves to death, through osmosis, and the recognition of sugar opening some cellular gates.
6
POPSBailout Might Make Things Worse * Hundreds of leading economists, including numerous Nobel prize winners, question the bailout * Former White House economist (Steve Hanke) adamantly opposes the bailout * Nobel prize economist and former chief economist of the World Bank (Joseph Stiglitz) opposes the bailout *The former Secretary of the Treasury (Paul O'Neill) questions the bailout * A prominent economist (Nouriel Roubini) says "The Treasury plan is a disgrace: a bailout of reckless bankers, lenders and investors that provides little direct debt relief to borrowers and financially stressed households and that will come at a very high cost to the US taxpayer. And the plan does nothing to resolve the severe stress in money markets and interbank markets that are now close to a systemic meltdown." * A highly-regarded economist (Michael Hudson) says that the bailout is a giveaway that will cause hyperinflation and dollar collapse
4
POPSHistorian on Panic of 1873 vs. now the current economic woes look a lot like what my 96-year-old grandmother still calls "the real Great Depression." She pinched pennies in the 1930s, but she says that times were not nearly so bad as the depression her grandparents went through. That crash came in 1873 and lasted more than four years. It looks much more like our current crisis.
1
POPSDinner Bell Rings for Financial Feeding Frenzy AIG today revealed what many private-equity firms, banks and asset managers want to know about the company’s asset sales to pay back an $85 billion government loan: What’s for dinner? AIG CEO Edward Liddy put an end to the suspense today. Here is what AIG is putting on the block: the U.S. life, retirement and pensions businesses, the personal-lines property-casualty business and at least a minority stake in its foreign life insurance business. All of AIG’s non-insurance businesses, including aircraft leasing, consumer finance division, U.S. auto insurance, a reinsurance business and asset manager, are also likely to be put on the block.