• Triad Biz Journal: N.C. foreclosures fall 6% in 3Q
  Some good news: "The number of foreclosures in North Carolina fell nearly 6 percent in the third quarter from the same period last year, according to data from RealtyTrac Inc."

  Tempered by not-so-good news:
  "Foreclosure filings, however, rose nearly 29 percent in the third quarter from the second quarter.

  Foreclosure filings in North Carolina rose 51 percent in September from the same period last year.

  Filings were down 13.5 percent last month from August."

  Uh oh.

  (tags: economics realestate)

• NYT: A GOP Agitator Not Named Palin
  In some circles this is called holding your nose: "On Capitol Hill, Ms. Bachmann is viewed with disdain by Democrats who see her as a wacky purveyor of outrageous claims and criticisms. Leading Republicans wince occasionally at her appearances on the floor and on television, but they also see her as someone with telegenic appeal who can energize conservatives and aggravate Democrats and they are not likely to rein her in."
  (tags: politics)

• Triad Biz Journal: UNCG gets $4M for homeless education
  "UNC-Greensboro's Serve Center has won a $4 million contract with the U.S. Department of Education for its National Center for Homeless Education, according to an announcement.

  The contract will fund operations of the center for five years. The NCHE was founded in 1998 and helps school districts, families and children meet the educational challenges of homelessness."

  (tags: piedmonttriad education)

• Godin: The problem with cable news thinking
  Godin writes the following:
  "Cable news thinking has nothing to do with fires or with politics. Instead, it amplifies the worst elements of emotional reaction:"
  Here he provides 12 traits of cable news (one is "Confusing opinion with the truth") and then writes "If I wanted to hobble an organization or even a country, I'd wish these twelve traits on them."
  (tags: media politics culture)

• AVC: The 'We Need to Own' Baloney
  Man do I agree with the basic premise here which I would boil down to "I'd rather have 10% of $100 than 40% of $20."
  (tags: business finance vc)

• GoofyWildcat: Apple is Evil
  I still don't understand why people are so fanatical about Apple. Dan points out why Apple is evil, although not "Darth Vader" evil.
  (tags: technology)

• Football, dog fighting, and brain damage : The New Yorker
  When I first heard about this article I thought that maybe Gladwell had gone too far by comparing football and dogfighting. After reading it I found it to be interesting and thoughtful and definitely worth the read.
  (tags: sports football nfl science health culture)

• 2010 Apartment Forecast: Uncertainty, But Optimism
  Looks like rental rates are expected to stay down for a while. From a presentation given by NAA's Doug Culkin:

  "The 'shadow market' competition that followed the housing market bust will continue to be felt in 2010, Culkin said, brought on by failed condo projects going rental, foreclosed single-family homes becoming rentals and a continued lack of job growth. For those on the operations side of the apartment market, next year’s outlook will be more of the same, he explained. 'We are looking at pressures on rental rates [to] remain, and vacancy rates are expected to remain higher than we would like.'"

  (tags: apartment taa)

• Pacing Toward a Fall: Airline's new owner came across as bringer of …
  According to Richard Craver's article Pace Airlines had problems before William Rodgers Sr. showed up and put a stake through its heart, but he certainly didn't do anything to forestall its demise:

  "He spoke in a folksy, yet brash tone, adding an exaggerated shrug of his shoulders for effect.

  'We're going to create jobs, make money and enjoy life, and honor and respect each other.'

  Less than four months later, Pace likely has been grounded for good by Rodgers' management."

  (tags: winston-salem business)

• Rex Hammock's RexBlog.com " Blog Archive " Wish hard enough and Google …
  Google Docs just keeps getting better. You can now organize and share via a folder system. I agree with this Google Docs assessment by Rex:

  "The primary reason I love Google Docs is that I like being able to ask several people to comment on something I’ve written (with each of them having their own comment color) more than the Word way of having copy “edited over.” And frankly, I’ve always thought the tracking feature of Word is worse than an editor’s red pen all over a page. I greatly prefer the wiki-like version tracking method of Google Docs (just click on the time of the last edit and you’ll see what I mean)."

  (tags: google googledocs web2.0)

• Freakonomics Announces Launch of Site That Threatens to Suck Me Into a Black Hole of Time Wasting
  "What’s more dangerous: a playground jungle gym or your office chair? As it happens, one in every 3,759 fatal accidental falls starts from a piece of playground equipment. You’re 85 times more likely, meanwhile, to fall to your death from a chair. That’s one of the many odd pairings waiting to be discovered in The Book of Odds, an online statistical encyclopedia launching tomorrow."
  (tags: coolstuff)

• This Week's Business Incentive Story That's NOT About Dell
  WXII has a story about Unilin trying to renegotiate part of their incentive deal with Davidson County: "Unilin Flooring, despite investing nearly $80 million at its Chair City headquarters, has requested that Thomasville officials waive the minimum job creation clause for 2010 in its 10-year economic development contract with the city."

  and

  “When we broke ground on this plant in 2004, we had planned to have almost 400 employees by this time and be well into the execution of our Phase 3 expansion,” Lauten wrote. “The reality is that we will employ approximately half that number at year end 2009. … Despite the economic challenges, we are still on track to have invested $80 million at this campus by the end of 2009 as we originally planned.”

  (tags: northcarolina piedmonttriad)

• Cone: Dude, You're Getting the Shaft
  "Had the busy Dell spoken longer, he might have said, 'We've also got a bunch of North Carolina taxpayer money that we've decided to just, y'know, keep, so that works to our benefit.'"
  (tags: winston-salem forsythcounty northcarolina businessopinion)

• Student housing for UNCG topic of meeting
  "Representatives for one of the country’s largest student housing developers will meet with the Greater Glenwood Neighborhood Association on Thursday as neighbors weigh a student housing project in the area."
  (tags: apartment studenthousing greensboro)
• Downtown W-S: Urban Living in Camel City
  23 of 30 residential units at 836 Oak Street (an old JG Flynt Tobacco building)have been leased or sold.
  (tags: winston-salem realestate apartment)
• Parents of "chunky" infant weigh in on health insurance reform – The …
  From the story: "Alex Lange is a chubby, dimpled, healthy and happy 4-month-old.

  But in the cold, calculating numbered charts of insurance companies, he is fat. That's why he is being turned down for health insurance. And that's why he is a weighty symbol of a problem in the health care reform debate."

  (tags: healthcare healthinsurance)

• Student housing plans hinge on property owners : News-Record.com …
  "The first step: the developer — Dinerstein Cos. of Houston — needs 49 property owners in a targeted 10-acre area of Glenwood to sell. Last month the company sent letters to owners, trying to gauge interest. The move caused a flap when some residents objected to the idea of an apartment-style student housing complex. But Lindsey said there has also been a lot of interest."
  (tags: apartment studenthousing greensboro)

• AVC: Open Subtitles
  Whenever I think I actually have a handle on all the latest offerings on the web I'm usually knocked down a peg or two when I read the blogs of people who really know what's going on. The latest instance is Fred Wilson's post on open subtitles: "The film is in swedish and the download I got did not have english subtitles. But fortunately Boxee supports Open Subtitles. If you are streaming or watching a downloaded video in Boxee, you can simply ask for subtitles and Boxee goes out and fetches them from opensubtitles.org."

  That's just amazing to me.

  (tags: web2.0 web)

• Tort Reform Report a Distraction?
  Lex writes: "Also, a lot of people will be making a big deal out of a Congressional Budget Office report that “tort reform” would save $54 billion from federal deficits during the next 10 years — $41 billion in spending reductions and $13 billion in new revenue.

  That’s not peanuts … except in the case of what the U.S. spends for health care. We spend roughly $2.4 trillion every year on it. So these savings would be the equivalent of saving a nickel on a $24 restaurant tab."

  (tags: healthcare politics government)

• NYT: Lobbyists Fight Last Big Plans to Cut Health Care Costs
  "As the health care debate moves to the floor of Congress, most of the serious proposals to fulfill President Obama’s original vow to curb costs have fallen victim to organized interests and parochial politics. "
  (tags: healthcare politics)

• Special Commemorative Stamp for Lewisville's 150th Anniversary
  Our town is celebrating 150 years this week and the postmaster is getting into the spirit. "The stamp, in the shape of a wagon wheel with a large "150" in the middle, will be placed on first-class postage during the celebration, scheduled for Oct. 17.

  Lewisville postmaster Michael Boone said he filed the paperwork for the special stamp after a suggestion by town officials."

  (tags: lewisville northcarolina)

• WXII: 929 Gallons Of Moonshine Seized In Wilkes County
  The roots of NASCAR still to be found in Northwest NC, or, White Lightning still to be found in the hills: "'This is one of the biggest seizures of white liquor I've seen come out of the mountains in my career,' Alcohol Law Enforcement Director John Ledford said Friday of the seizure of 929 gallons of moonshine at a home on Shew Ridge Mission Road.
  (tags: northcarolina)
• Hammock: Here’s who will run the internet if the nuts have their way
  "Just in time for the National Peanut Festival, AP President Tom Curley is sounding nuttier and nuttier:"
  (tags: web media web2.0)
• Alcoa and PCBs in the Yadkin River
  From a press release from the Yadkin Riverkeeper: "The Yadkin Riverkeeper® has announced that the cleanup Alcoa performed at the boat ramp access below Narrows Dam on Badin Lake Oct. 10-12 is a direct result of the PCBs discovered and linked to the company’s operations below Badin Lake, which have traveled as far down river as the Falls Dam boat launch."
  (tags: environment northcarolina winston-salem)
• BBC: Parents 'should supply alcohol'
  Where was this research when I was 16?

  "University researchers questioned nearly 10,000 15 to 16-year-olds in the north-west of England.

  They got into trouble more when buying their own cheap alcohol, rather than getting access from parents, it found.

  Carefully introducing alcohol to children may help them "prepare themselves for life in an adult environment dominated by this drug", said the study."

  (tags: parent interesting)

• Fec: Our Burglar Class
  Ugh: "Matt Taibbi has another damning article in the current issue of Rolling Stone detailing the criminal exploits of the “300 white guys in Manhattan.” He begins by relating the story of a $1.7M put on Bear Stearns a few days before it went Tango Uniform, resulting in a $270M profit. Eighteen months later, the SEC refuses to identify the trader.

  Taibbi also chronicles how Geithner and Paulson at the Fed conspired with Morgan Stanley and Goldman Sachs to kill their competitors, Bear Stearns, Lehman Bros. and Merrill Lynch. This is not exactly news, but bears repeating as proof the foxes are in the hen house."

  (tags: finance economy)

• Rhino Times: Arnold's Plan May Be First In Nation
  "The board voted to pass a bold and sweeping economic incentive policy, a plan that, as far as anyone can tell, hasn't been tried anywhere in the country"
  (tags: greensboro guilfordcounty)

• WebMonkey: BoingBoing’s Redesign Uncovers the Dark Side of Web Fonts
  For all my designer friends. Even the big dogs get bit when they mess with fonts.
  (tags: web2.0)

• Leyden: Dell plant closing to have significant effect on Triad jobs market
  "Unfortunately, however, if other communities are using incentives, there is strong pressure to do so as well. And as analysis of this Prisoners' Dilemma problem shows, the solution requires a cooperative solution which likely would involve a general ban on such activity. But I see no evidence that state and local governments want to take that route."
  (tags: economics government piedmonttriad winston-salem forsythcounty forsythcountyeconomics)

• Harvard Biz Blog: The Dismal Financial IQ of US Managers
  "Our experience over the years has shown us that the vast majority of managers and leaders in Fortune 1000 companies have deficiencies in their basic financial knowledge. We spend most of our time teaching managers and leaders in corporate America how to read their own financial statements, understand key financial measures, and use financial tools to understand the data."
  (tags: finance business)

• Notes on This Week's Column: A New Consumer?: The Balance Sheet : The …
  "A generation ago, Warren says, basics (housing costs, health insurance, transportation, education, and taxes) accounted for fifty-four per cent of the average family’s income. Today, they account for seventy-five per cent of it. Now, some of those costs arguably do reflect a lack of frugality—homes are more expensive in part because they’re so much bigger. But the fact that more than fifteen per cent of personal consumption expenditures now go to medical care, when in 1930 only three per cent of personal consumption did, isn’t a reflection of frivolity, and that’s not going to change any time soon."
  (tags: economy)
• Google's PowerMeter Bypasses the Smart Meter, Signs Up First Gadget Partner
  Getting smart energy management for your house without having to wait for your utility to install it. Interesting.
  (tags: energy google)
• EthicsDaily: SBC Leader Invokes Nazis in Health-Care Discussion
  Health care reform is vitally important to our country, but I fear that whatever reform we get will not go nearly far enough to truly help us or our economy. One problem is we have people in prominent positions saying crap like what a leader in the Southern Baptist Convention said:
  "A top Southern Baptist official has accused President Barack Obama and congressional Democratic leaders of attempting to do 'precisely what the Nazis did.'" and "'The Nazis said people should be euthanized when they had lives unworthy of life,' Land argued. 'Well, at the very least Dr. Emanuel, [House Speaker] Nancy Pelosi, [Sen.] Max Baucus and President Obama are saying that some people have lives less worthy of life. And the older you are, the sicker you are, the less valuable your life is and the more likely they want to terminate your care.'"

  Look, I have no problem with anyone disagreeing with the Democrats' reform proposals, but comparing the Democrats to Nazis is beyond the pale.

  (tags: healthcare religion)

• Hammock: A journalist counting trend story from tomorrow’s Wall Street Journal
  My favorite part of Rex Hammock's post is this bit: "Over the weekend, PaidContent.org’s Staci Kramer passed along a joke via Twitter she heard at the Online News Association awards:
  How does a journalist count?
  “One, two, Trend!”"
  (tags: journalism media)

• Raleigh N&O: Foxx Guarding the Health Care House
  From the story: "U.S. Rep. Virginia Foxx, a Republican from Banner Elk, is warning that Democrats will try to sneak health care reform through Congress.

  It's the political equivalent of slipping a 747 through a toll booth, but Foxx told 1240 3WC, "Hometown Christian Radio," in Wilkesboro that she thinks Democrats will put health care reform inside another piece of legislation that lawmakers would find difficult to oppose."

  (tags: healthcare government politics)

Just in time too because I’m ready to send them to whichever farm bad dogs are taken to.
Sent from my Verizon Wireless BlackBerry

• Now That's Just Mean
  Stealing is bad. Stealing from a charity is really bad.
  (tags: northcarolina charity piedmonttriad)
• Now That's an Obit
  Esbee linked to this at Life in Forsyth. A truly awesome obit.
  (tags: funny newspaper)
• GWU: Sigma Chi dedicates townhouse
  When I was at George Mason U back in the 80s I was a member of a petitioning local chapter of Sigma Chi and we spent a lot of time at the house of George Washington U's Sigma Chi chapter (Epsilon) participating in all kinds of clean fun like mantle diving (don't ask). I didn't realize they'd gotten into a bunch of trouble and lost their house about 10 years, but it looks like they've made a pretty full recovery with the dedication of their new house.
  (tags: school)