Sen. Byron Dorgan Wants Accountability

Good news! Sen. Byron Dorgan (ND), who chairs the Democratic Policy Committee (DPC) in the Senate, wants accountability from military contractors who eagerly take taxpayer dollars and then use them to carelessly kill or sicken our troops. Read his blog post below, visit his website, and get involved! DPC TO CONTINUE DRIVE FOR OVERSIGHT, ACCOUNTABILITY FOR IRAQ AND AFGHANISTAN CONTRACTORS U.S. Senator Byron Dorgan, Chairman, Democratic Policy Committee The Senate Democratic Policy Committee (DPC) has launched the “Accountability Series,” which features video on congressional efforts to ensure accountability in government. Congressional oversight is one of the most important congressional responsibilities. Sadly, during the George W. Bush Administration, when Congress and the White House were controlled by the same political party, that responsibility was routinely ignored. It was as if the majority party at the time, Republicans, didn’t want to embarrass a President of their own political party. That was particularly true when it came to the Iraq and Afghanistan wars. Congress was appropriating billions of taxpayer dollars, with much of it going to private contractors who did work soldiers used to do. But neither the Congress, nor the Executive Branch did much to check how that money was spent or how the contractors performed. Literally billions of dollars were wasted as a result. In 2003, as Chairman of the DPC, I moved to fill that void. Since our first hearing months after the war started, we’ve held 19 oversight hearings on Iraq and Afghanistan contracting. What we found may be the greatest amount of waste, fraud and contracting abuses in the history of our country. DPC hearings exposed a contractor charging taxpayers for twice as many meals as it actually served. We found a contractor delivering water to U.S. troops that water was more contaminated than water from the nearby Euphrates River. An internal document we obtained from a company whistleblower acknowledged that this occurred and described it as a “near miss” that could have caused “mass sickness and even death.” Yet the company and, astonishingly, the Army continued to deny it ever happened. DPC hearings found that U.S. National Guard troops and a contractor’s own employees had been recklessly exposed to a deadly carcinogen, sodium dichromate, at one site. No one was given protective gear until it was too late. Many soldiers weren’t told about the exposure until we started pushing to insist that they be told. We found electrical wiring on U.S. military bases in Iraq done so incompetently that U.S. troops were regularly shocked in their shower stalls. Some were even electrocuted as they showered, or as they did something as routine as power-washing a Humvee. Today we have a new administration. There are encouraging signs that the Obama Administration takes its responsibility to safeguard tax dollars and to hold contractors accountable far more seriously than the previous administration. But congressional oversight is still urgently required, and the DPC’s oversight work will continue. During World War II, then-Senator Harry Truman showed us that politics should have nothing to do with protecting our soldiers and taxpayers. He established and chaired what came to be called the Truman Committee in the Senate. It kept a close eye on war contracting. He insisted that taxpayers get their money’s worth and that soldiers get equipment and weapons that worked. The Truman Committee saved billions of taxpayer dollars and exposed countless examples of shoddy work that cheated taxpayers and endangered American soldiers. The President at that time? Franklin D. Roosevelt, a fellow Democrat, whom Truman would later serve as Vice President. Congressional oversight must be a year-round, every-day responsibility, regardless of whether the President is a Democrat or Republican. The billions of tax dollars provided to Wall Street, the banks, and the big automakers only makes congressional responsibility to ensure that tax dollars are spent wisely more urgent. The “Accountability Series” features Democratic Senators who have been among the most active in the DPC’s oversight hearings. They talk candidly about the need for congressional oversight and their experience in pursuing it. The conversation is an ongoing one. This new video series will be updated regularly with news of developments and comments from Senators who are working to ensure that your tax dollars are spent wisely. Check it regularly, and please use our comment section to join the conversation.

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Playing with the Pre and 3GS

I've been so busy with moving and everything, that I'm not on top of my gadget fondling. Well, I cut out of work on time today, and went to the nearest Sprint store, to spend some quality time with a Palm Pre. And then after dinner, I ambled over to the Apple Store in the Marina to play with an iPhone 3GS. And I have to say, at this point, I have a pretty tough decision ahead of me. First, the Palm. In the Sprint store, the two Pre's that they had on display were annoyingly tethered -- while it was possible to pick the device up, the tether wanted to pull it back to earth. Annoying. Even more annoying, the demo units were running some sort of special demo software, which was supposed to highlight the features of the Pre. But in reality, all it served to do was get in the way -- it kept popping up and annoying me, and it continually ran in the background. I'm wondering if that application caused some of the middling performance that I observed while playing with the Pre: A Palm Pre, smudged by countless hands (mine included)... Nevertheless, the Pre is pretty cool. I was actually hoping that it would be a lot faster than my original iPhone, but in side-by-side tests (with Daring Fireball loaded in both browsers), scrolling speed & wait time for the phone to catch up was about identical. And the keyboard seems like it is OK, not great. I was able to type accurately, but slowly. I'm sure that I could get faster with practice, but as of right now, I'm really hooked on side-typing on iPhone 3.0. I will say that the "card" interface on the Pre is pretty cool. I liked being able to re-arrange cards, and swipe them up to close the application. The metaphor seems strong, and I think will serve WebOS well into the future. And the "hidden gesture area" is neat as well -- it actually has little lights that show that the phone recognized your input (which I just have missed in the 3 or 4 reviews that I read). I followed-up my Pre experience by spending some quality time with the new iPhone 3GS at an Apple Store. And the experience here was just much better, all the way around. Apple has a bunch of iPhones that you can play with, and they're all loaded up with applications, music, movies, etc. There is a demo movie that plays when the iPhone is idle, but once you start playing with it, you are never pestered. And the speed. The speed is quite impressive. I did several side-by-side tests with my original iPhone and the iPhone 3GS (dual-wielding, if you will). Since Apple runs an open WiFi network in their stores, I was able to have both phones attached to the same network. The iPhone 3GS wasn't much faster in my Daring Fireball test, but it absolutely blew away the original iPhone in the New York Times test. I mean, it's not even funny. With my current iPhone, I have whole list of websites that are "mobile friendly" that I visit when using Mobile Safari. It seems like with the iPhone 3GS, you can just visit any website -- so long as it doesn't have flash, the enhanced processor in the iPhone 3GS will make the site usable. In fact, the iPhone 3GS brought a smile to my face several times when I was playing with it, which the Palm failed to accomplish. I like the weight and feel of the iPhone better than that of the Pre (although I think I still prefer the original iPhone with the flat back). And I could definitely use a boost in storage capacity the the iPhone 3GS affords over the Pre. But I do like the idea of being able to write web apps for my phone, and the Pre does have some interesting innovations over the iPhone. I think that my 2 year contract with AT&T is up this Friday, so I'll have some more pondering to do next week. -Andy.

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Richesin to appear at Carpe Librum

Maryville native Nicki Richesin will be at Carpe Librum at 6 p.m. tomorrow evening, July 1, to read from her current anthology of essays about the relationships between mothers and daughters, "Because I Love Her: 34 Women Writers Reflect on the Mother-Daughter Bond." This is Richesin's fourth collection as editor and her other work includes "What I Would Tell Her: 30 Male Writers on the Father-Daughter Relationship" (May 2010); the forthcoming "Crush 30: Real-life Tales of First Love Gone Wrong by our Best Young Adult Novelists"; and "The May Queen: Women on Life, Work, and Pulling it all Together in your Thirties." For more about Richesin and her work, visit her web site at www.nickirichesin.com or check out this video trailer about the book with several of the essayists discussing their stories. Carpe Librum is at 5113A Kingston Pike in the Bearden area of Knoxville.

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New Timbuk2 Cooler Keeps Your Drinks Cold and Incognito

Tired of shoving your beers in your messenger bag? Now, with the new Dolores Chiller, you no longer have to worry about those frosty beverages ruining your laptop. Sure, it looks like a regular ol’ laptop bag –but wait! — … [visit site to read more]

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Was Debby Smith a plant? [Darleen Click]

Dan Riehl points out some interesting facts about the teary, photo-op at Obama’s stage-managed “townhall” … [visit site to read more]

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A busy week or so. This week, Tuesday & Wednesday are my Weekend.

Back from Download site work on the 18th June. missing Billy Bragg, as I couldn't be arsed to leave the house and just wanted to shower, eat and drink. I'd agreed to work UFO on Friday, but realised I'd be battered from Download so got covered for that job. 20th of June was 'The Saturdays' and a long day with a difficult load out, as it was a seated gig. Sunday and Monday off. I can't remember what I did, just sat at home going Engghhh I think. Tuesday the 23rd Was an Evening with Joe Calzaghe Plus Sir Henry Cooper. Sport isn't my thing, especially not boxing, so i just did the load in and load out. Wednesday was 'Blur' who seemed to have all the lights in the world and another tough-ish load out, but a stonking atmosphere for the show and some old pals, working on the lamps and drum tech'ing. Thursday 25th was 'Fleet Foxes' a nice surprise for me as I didn't know any of their tunes, but seeing part of the show meant I discovered a new band. The lampee was another old pal, but again what seemed like a difficult load out, especially considering that there was bugger all gear. I'm not sure if it was because I was tired, or the colleagues I was working with were being especially dense. Friday 26th was Jimmy Carr upstairs and 'Pendulum' downstairs. I couldn't be bothered to sit through a comedians set and only wanted to have a neb at 'Pendulum' as I'm getting bored of hearing their tunes at the clubnights. I was impressed with the sound during the sound check and they had a top light show. Saturday 27th Was 'Lenny Kravitz'. What a pile of arse, but I was up-rigging for the show, which I always enjoy, and a good pal had come down to ground rig for us. So it was a good day, we had a pint at dinner time, then went to see another pal who used to work for us, just to chew the fat and watch a bit of Glastonbury on his TV, before it was time to head back for the Load out. Sunday 28th was another day sitting at home going Engghhh. That brings us to Monday 29th, and 'The Dave Matthews Band'. Another day up-Rigging, with my pal grounding for us. For a mostly American touring crew, everyone I had to deal with were really nice. Though I heard that the runners had a bit of a 'mare with one of the production people. Sweated like a bastard dicking around putting the points in, then did dribs and drabs, 'til it was time to put the safeties on the PA. 31C in the roof. My head started leaking as soon as I got up there. More sweating and dripping on my specs'. That was around 14:00 and we were done 'til load out. So off to the nearest pub, for a cold Cider to replace essential bodily fluids, then off to 'The Bell' at Tong. One of the pubs they send us to eat at when we're working on the 'V Festival before catering has arrived, or after it's gone off site. They do proper full on meals that make you feel you've had your moneys worth, rather than something expensive, with a fancy description on the menu, but that ultimately leaves you wishing you'd ordered two meals. A mixed grill for me. After that we headed off to the Cosford RAF Museum to kill more time, we only had time to look at the 'planes in one of the buildings. I had Airfix models of some of them and seeing the real thing was great. You'd be surprised, how big some aircraft are, and also how small others are when you get to stand right next to them. By the time we'd bimbled about the one building, we didn't have time to look at the Cold war exhibition, which is housed in another spectacular, modern, asymmetric/weird shaped building. Something for another day then. When we left, thunder was rumbling and the sky towards Wolves was that Purple heading to black colour of a proper thunderstorm. We didn't see any of it, but the road was wet and we passed through a couple of flooded sections, with popped man-hole covers and the smell of sewage. We still had the evening to kill so popped back to the same pal from the other day to chew some more fat, until it was time to head back to work, via the chippy. Caught a bit of DMB and the bits I heard were Jazzy/Santana-esque. I'm not sure I'll go out of my way looking for their music. Load out was sweet, with the temperature in the roof having dropped to only 30C, but with outrageous humidity from all the sweat that had risen off the punters below. More sweating, but a nice efficient load out. Despite some of the nasty load outs a good week or so that I've enjoyed. Especially Monday, with the visit to the Aircraft Museum. A couple of days off. When I need to get some food in and do laundry stuff. Then it's on to working house tech' for the Methodist Conference on Thursday. Read and post comments | Send to a friend

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Boost Your Business With A Restaurant Newsletter

By Jose L Riesco A restaurant newsletter is an ideal way to boost your business and develop a relationship with customers. It can be done in electronic form and sent to email lists and posted on your restaurant website, in print form to be mailed and given to customers at the restaurant, or a combination of both. A combination of sales, promotion, marketing and public relations are required to achieve long-term success with any small business. As far as a restaurant is concerned, in order to fill your tables frequently you will need to make sure that your current customers return, and that you can attract new ones. Customers are the cornerstone of your business. Make sure that your atmosphere, value for money, quality of food and highly trained, attentive staff are ready. A restaurant newsletter is an ideal way to boost your business and develop a relationship with customers. You can decide to do a printed version that you can mail, distribute to the neighborhood businesses or just leave by the door at the restaurant, or having an electronic newsletter that you can email. I would suggest a combination of both since in this way you cover all your customer’s preferences. Your restaurant newsletter should have the same image than your restaurant. If your restaurant is formal and upscale, so it should be your newsletter. If you are a casual, family restaurant, then your bulletin should have a fun and friendly look and be written in an upbeat, casual tone. In any type of printed or online materials about your restaurant, relevant information should be provided somewhere, whether in a box off to the side, as part of the title box, or as an informational line at the bottom. Pertinent information includes name of restaurant, street address, phone and fax numbers, hours of operation, website address and email address. The content of your restaurant newsletter should be less self-promoting and more customer-focused. The restaurant newsletter should not be self-promoting, it should be customer focused. The customer wants to know about your monthly specials, your charitable commitments, any new seasonal menus, a story behind this month’s recipe, your new celebrity chef, industry trends, or new features of your restaurant. It is important that you maintain a consistent delivery date (even if it’s only quarterly). If you overdo the communication, customers will view it as advertising rather than information. A monthly publication is probably best if you have a lot going on, but if you change menus seasonally and don’t hold many special events or fundraisers, then consider a quarterly one. A good restaurant newsletter is one that customers can quickly read. You don’t need to write long articles. Short articles with short sentences will do better. Catchy headlines and dividers to separate articles also help. Be sure to break up text with white space. Include only one or two small images, whether of food, staff, or other appropriate photo, so as not to jam a persons email box. With any restaurant newsletter, be sure to provide links. If you are printing your newsletter, don’t forget to include clear links so that your customers can follow when they have access to a computer. Very Important: Don’t forget to include instructions on how to subscribe to your list and to recommend to forward your newsletters to their friends and family. You should think about offering incentives to new subscribers and setup a formalized referral system for your existing subscribers. Encouraging feedback by asking a question or taking a poll is also a great feature to include in a newsletter. Jose L Riesco worked in the IT industry for 18 years and owned a restaurant before working full time as a consultant and marketing expert. By creating a unique client-centric Strategy, restaurateurs will be able to dramatically increase their sales while reducing marketing expenses. To find more about his Restaurant Marketing Strategies and his new book visit his web site: http://www.myrestaurantmarketing.com To reuse this article for free, please review our publishers guide

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How to Prepare your iPhone 3GS for Jailbreak

Last night, the Dev-Team released some info about the how to prepare the iPhone 3GS for jailbreaking. However, there wasn’t a guide yet. This morning there is a guide. Below is the info via the Dev-Team. You will want to check out their website for the how-to guide. … [visit site to read more]

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Stuff to know before jumping from Windows XP to Windows 7

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Php Auction Script, Php Real Estate Script, Php Job Portal Script, Php Dating Script, Php Classified Script

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