The Government Domain: Tracking Congress 2.0 – With the 111th Congress of the United States reconvening on September 8th, e-gov expert Peggy Garvin highlights new tools and sources that enhance and expand your ability to track and monitor the action.
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Monthly Archives: August 2009
New GAO Reports: Disaster Recovery, Medicare Physician Payments, Private Health Insurance, Home Mortgage Interest Deduction
Border Patrol: Checkpoints Contribute to Border Patrol’s Mission, but More Consistent Data Collection and Performance Measurement Could Improve Effectiveness, GAO-09-824, August 31, 2009 Disaster Recovery: Experiences from Past Disasters Offer Insights for Effective Collaboration after Catastrophic Events, GAO-09-811, July 31, 2009 Medicare Physician Payments: Fees Could Better Reflect Efficiencies Achieved When Services Are Provided Together,… Continue Reading
Preliminary Annual Report on U.S. Holdings of Foreign Securities
News release: “The survey measured U.S. holdings at year-end 2008 of approximately $4.3 trillion, with $2.7 trillion held in foreign equities, $1.3 trillion in foreign long-term debt securities (original term-to-maturity in excess of one year), and $0.3 trillion held in foreign short-term debt securities. The previous such survey, conducted as of year-end 2007, measured U.S.… Continue Reading
New Nationwide Insurance survey shows overwhelming support for laws banning texting while driving
News release: “Nationwide Insurance today released the results of its new On Your Side® survey, which found that 8 in 10 Americans surveyed this month say they would support legislation restricting cell phone use while driving. The survey, conducted Aug. 5-9, 2009, by Harris Interactive, reports that 80 percent of Americans favor a ban on… Continue Reading
Google Translate now speaks 51 languages
Official Google Blog: “Today, we’re excited to announce that we’ve added nine new languages to Google Translate: Afrikaans, Belarusian, Icelandic, Irish, Macedonian, Malay, Swahili, Welsh and Yiddish. That means that Google Translate now supports 51 languages and 2550 language pairs including all 23 official EU languages.” Continue Reading
Credit Cards: New Law Protects Consumers from Surprise Fees, Rate Increases and Other Penalties
FDIC Consumer News, Summer 2009 – Credit Cards: New Law Protects Consumers from Surprise Fees, Rate Increases and Other Penalties “In May, Congress passed and President Obama signed the Credit Card Accountability Responsibility and Disclosure Act of 2009 the Credit CARD Act the most sweeping statutory changes in card protections for consumers since… Continue Reading
Survey: Monetary Policy Right for Now, but Eventual Tightening Needed
“The NABE Economic Policy Survey presents the consensus of a panel of 266 members of the National Association for Business Economics. Conducted semiannually, this survey was taken Aug. 3-18, 2009.” “Economists surveyed earlier this month by the National Association for Business Economics expressed strong agreement with the current posture of monetary policy and viewed the… Continue Reading
IMF Injecting $283 Billion in SDRs into Global Economy, Boosting Reserves
News release: “With much of the world still mired in recession, the IMF took action to bolster its members reserves through an allocation of SDRs, or Special Drawing Rights. The allocation, equivalent to $250 billion, was made on August 28 and will be followed by an additional, albeit much smaller, allocation of $33 billion on… Continue Reading
Bank Bailout Repayments Now Total $4 Billion
New York Times: Nearly a year after the federal rescue of the nations biggest banks, taxpayers have begun seeing profits from the hundreds of billions of dollars in aid that many critics thought might never be seen again. The profits, collected from eight of the biggest banks that have fully repaid their obligations to the… Continue Reading
New on LLRX.com: Crowd Competition and Community Standards at the #AALL2009 Conference
Re-Hashing the Hash Tag – Crowd Competition and Community Standards at the #AALL2009 Conference: Roger V. Skalbeck and Meg Kribble describe how the majority of social media activity during the 2009 AALL conference took place on Twitter, and how this technology impacts the profession and the free exchange of information, moving forward. Continue Reading
FEMA Searchable Disaster Photo Library
Disaster Photo Library – FEMA: “The FEMA on line Photo Library contains more than 16,500 disaster related photographs made since 1989. The collection is composed almost entirely of declared disasters and there are also photographs from FEMA public events which have occurred in Washington, DC. The photographs are of Hurricanes, Tornadoes, Floods, Typhoons, Fires, Avalanches,… Continue Reading
Medical Bankruptcy in the United States, 2007: Results of a National Study
Medical Bankruptcy in the United States, 2007: Results of a National Study, David U. Himmelstein, MD, Deborah Thorne, PhD, Elizabeth Warren, JD, Steffie Woolhandler, MD, MPH. The American Journal of Medicine (2009). “Our 2001 study in 5 states found that medical problems contributed to at least 46.2% of all bankruptcies. Since then, health costs and… Continue Reading
