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Howard Lovy wrote:

Wayne State University in Detroit and Walsh College in Troy, MI, will get an entrepreneur training program called LaunchPad off the ground thanks to a $2 million grant from the Blackstone Charitable Foundation. Detroit’s New Economy Initiative will partner with New York-based Blackstone to launch the program that it hopes will be come a “national model for fostering entrepreneurship through higher education.” A similar program at the University of Miami attracted more than 1,000 students and young alumni who received support enabling them to create 45 new businesses and 102 new jobs, according to Blackstone.

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UNDERWRITERS AND PARTNERS

Filed under: Spy Photos, Budget, Sedan, Volkswagen

If a report from Autocar India is to be believed, the upcoming four-door version of the Volkswagen Polo may be badged as the Vento in India. Vento is not a new name for VW – the Mk III Jetta sedan used that badge in the European market throughout the mid-90s.

Volkswagen has reportedly increased the wheelbase of the three-box Polo by two inches to provide rear seat passengers a bit more space. The lengthened roof should also aid head room out back, although eliminating the hatch will surely cut down on cargo volume and accessibility.

The Indian Vento is powered by either a 1.6-liter inline-four or a 1.6-liter common rail turbodiesel. If and when this car makes it to America it will probably use the 105 horsepower turbocharged and direct injected 1.2 TSI four-pot available in Europe.

Although Volkswagen still hasn’t officially committed to selling the Polo in the U.S., VW of America officials have said that they would probably wait until a four door sedan is available with a probable launch in 2011. The Vento is expected to launch in India this summer.

[Source: Autocar India]

Report: Volkswagen Polo sedan to be dubbed Vento in India, coming in July originally appeared on Autoblog on Fri, 30 Apr 2010 08:28:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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We’ve heard of two for the price of one. It’s generally considered a good deal if you can get it. So what would you call one for the price of two?

Maybe “Barry Diller.” As chairman and chief executive of IAC/InterActiveCorp (IACI), the sprawling Internet conglomerate, and chairman and “senior executive” of Expedia (EXPE), the online travel service, Diller collected just about two of everything last year — and it made for a tidy sum indeed.

We caught a glimpse of this when Expedia filed its proxy on April 27, but we didn’t get the big picture, as it were, until IAC followed with its own proxy filing on Wednesday. We’ll cut to the chase:

• Diller’s salaries were modest by titan-of-industry standards: $965,000 combined, with $500,000 coming from IAC (despite being the smaller company, at $2.65 billion market-cap to Expedia’s $7.1 billion).
• The companies made up for that with bonuses: $3.7 million total, of which $2 million came from Expedia.
• Only Expedia awarded options last year, valued at $1.34 million.
• Diller’s total haul: $7.74 million, with IAC paying 42% and Expedia paying 58%.

But the perks really made the one-for-two special shine. Without putting both proxies side by side, you might miss the fact that Diller’s employers spent a whopping $1.7 million on his personal air travel: $991,553 at IAC and $704,262 at Expedia. And that doesn’t even include the $911,000 in personal flights that IAC says Diller paid for. (It’s not clear whether he also paid Expedia for some flights beyond those reported as income; the company doesn’t appear to disclose any such payments, however.)

The explanation is the usual one for both companies. Here’s IAC:

“Pursuant to Company policy, Mr. Diller is required to travel, both for business and personal purposes, on corporate aircraft. In addition to serving general security interests, this means of travel permits him to travel non-stop and without delay, to remain in contact with the Company while he is traveling, to change his plans quickly in the event Company business requires, and to conduct confidential Company business while flying, be it telephonically, by email or in person. These interests are similarly furthered on both business and personal flights, as Mr. Diller typically provides his services to the Company while traveling in either case. … For certain personal use of the corporate aircraft, Mr. Diller reimburses the Company at the maximum rate allowable under applicable rules of the Federal Aviation Administration.”

And here’s Expedia’s:

“Pursuant to Company policy, Mr. Diller … [is] encouraged to travel, both for business and personal purposes, on corporate aircraft. In addition to serving general security interests, this means of travel permits [him] to travel non-stop and without delay, to remain in contact with the Company while traveling, to change plans quickly in the event Company business requires, and to conduct confidential Company business while flying, be it telephonically, by email or in person. These interests are similarly furthered on both business and personal flights, as Mr. Diller … typically provide[s] services to the Company while traveling in either case.”

(We removed references to the company’s chief executive officer, who also gets free personal plane rides, from Expedia’s original language.) But we did find it interesting that IAC said Diller’s jet usage was required and at Expedia, it’s encouraged.

We hesitate to think how much time Diller spends in the air. That kind of cash could buy 98 last-minute, first-class round trips from New York’s JFK airport to Tokyo’s Narita on American Airlines (with nearly $2,500 left over for cab-fare) — and those tickets were $17,279 a pop when we checked on kayak.com early this morning. The companies also say they spent a total of $871,000 on salaries, and possibly other costs on maintaining the corporate aircraft generally — with $471,000 from IAC –but that covers business use as well as personal.

The rest of Diller’s perks are a little harder to itemize: They add up to $70,519 (61% from IAC), and include everything from personal use of third-party car services to office-space and technical support for Diller’s personal staff.

Equally intriguing may be the way Expedia and IAC have decided “to share certain expenses associated with such usage, as well as certain costs incurred by IAC in connection with the provision of certain benefits to Mr. Diller.” Expedia picks up 35%, and IAC picks up 65%. Over the course of the year, IAC says Expedia paid it $241,000 under this arrangement (Expedia pegs it at “approximately $250,000″), presumably balancing out any divergence from that split. “Expenses include costs for personal use of cars and equipment dedicated to Mr. Diller’s use and expenses relating to Mr. Diller’s support staff,” the proxy says, so there’s some overlap with the figures above.

Of course, the more we look at it, the more we realize it really is a two-for-one deal — for Diller. From that perspective, it’s not half bad.

Technology Review has an article on efforts to capture energy when users press the touch-screens of mobile devices – Self-Powered Flexible Electronics.

Now researchers at Samsung and Sungkyunkwan University in Korea have come up with a way to capture power when a touch screen flexes under a user’s touch. The researchers have integrated flexible, transparent electrodes with an energy-scavenging material to make a film that could provide supplementary power for portable electronics. The film can be printed over large areas using roll-to-roll processes, but are at least five years from the market.

The screens take advantage of the piezoelectric effect–the tendency of some materials to generate an electrical potential when they’re mechanically stressed. Materials scientists are developing devices that use nanoscale piezoelectronics to scavenge mechanical energy, such as the vibrations caused by footsteps. But the field is young, and some major challenges remain. The power output of a single piezoelectric nanowire is quite small (around a picowatt), so harvesting significant power requires integrating many wires into a large array; materials scientists are still experimenting with how to engineer these screens to make larger devices.

GUANTANAMO BAY — Col. Patrick Parrish, the judge presiding over Omar Khadr’s military commission, gaveled the third day of the proceedings into session. For the second morning in a row, Khadr is not in the room.

Khadr received medical treatment yesterday for what a retired Army medical corps general called an “urgent” condition resulting from shrapnel that remains in his eyes from his 2002 capture in Afghanistan. He initially resisted attending his hearing after officers at the detention facility attempted to place blacked-out goggles on his face for transportation to the courthouse, which he considered painful and humiliating and which aggravated his condition, according to ret. Brig. Gen. Stephen Xenakis.

Jeff Groharing, the chief prosecutor in Khadr’s case, immediately called Khadr’s absence “voluntary.” Marine Capt. Laura Bruzzese testified that Khadr told her this morning his eye is feeling better — at one point, she said, he joked with her, “I hope you don’t have to be a witness today” — but objected that the guards “are trying to intimidate” him by performing what she said was a standard search of his waistband to ensure no items were smuggled out of Camp Delta. The search entails a guard using a finger to stretch the elastic waistband on a detainee’s pants all around his midsection, shaking it, to see if anything falls out. “The cuffs were hurting his shoulder” as well, she testified he told her “almost an aside.”

“I want to come to court, but I want to come respectfully,” Khadr told Bruzzese, she testified. Rather than experience another provocation and potentially jeopardize his case through an outburst, she said, he opted not to attend.

“I understand the sensitivity” with testimony about detainee movements from Camp Delta, said Khadr lawyer Barry Coburn, but requested Parrish to consider the impact of the procedures for transferring detainees “insofar as it relates to his state of anxiety.” His cross-examination of Bruzzese briefly took an odd detour into figuring out “which digit” is typically used by a guard in a waistband search.

“My client is perceiving he is being penalized… by an actual de facto change in the process,” Coburn said, despite firm denials from the military that no deviation from standard procedure for detainee transport has occurred in Khadr’s case.

Parrish ruled that Khadr’s absence is voluntary and without extenuating circumstance. “No one has disrespected Mr. Khadr,” he said. “We will continue without him.”

Four years in the making, the Acadalus tripod head uses motors and an inclinometer to relieve you of fiddling and make sure your shots are absolutely, positively straight. Of course, that perspectival perfection comes at a price: $5000. More »

Ford has announced a series of changes to key personnel for its Asia Pacific and Africa (APA) region. The changes pertain to senior management positions and are intended to strengthen regional operations in what Ford has targeted as key markets.

Ford’s group vice president and president, Asia Pacific and Africa, has announced a series of senior executive appointments across the APA region involving members of the leadership teams in China, India, Japan and the Philippines.

Among the many moves come appointments of new country presidents in the Philippines and Japan, a newly promoted sales head in the emerging market of India, a new leadership post within Ford’s joint venture in China, Changan Ford Mazda Automobile (CFMA) and a key international development assignment.

List of changes to executive personnel

*Randy Krieger is appointed president of Ford Group Philippines, replacing Rick Baker. Krieger previously served as president of Ford Japan.

*Tim Tucker is appointed president of Ford Japan, replacing Krieger. Tucker previously served as vice president of Sales, Ford India.

*Richard Baker, appointed deputy general manager of CFMA, replacing Wesley Liu. Baker previously served as president of Ford Group Philippines.

*Wesley Liu is assigned to a new post at Ford’s World Headquarters in Dearborn, Michigan. He was formerly deputy general manager of CFMA.

*N. Raja is named vice president of Sales, Ford India, replacing Tucker. Raja was previously general manager of Sales, Ford India.

Ford says that it has started a renewed focus on the APA regions now that they have begun to earn a profit in the U.S. market, allowing more resources and time to be allocated to other key global markets.

Source: Leftlane

Charles Stross is in good form with an essay on the post-PC world. It’s the world we’ve been expecting since Netscape Constellation (1996) and Larry Ellison’s proto-netbook (1995). That world became real for me in 2007 (yes, it was that long ago) with the iPhone and in 2008 with the Target netbook [1].

I agree with almost everything he wrote, with one big exception….

… Moreover, the PC revolution has saturated the market at any accessible price point. That is, anyone who needs and can afford a PC has now got one…

Uhhh, no. PCs are not cheap. Not at all. The iPad is cheap [3], but PCs are very expensive.

Yes, you can buy a “PC” for a pittance. It makes a crummy boat anchor though. If you want it to do something useful you need to buy internet service. Where I live that’s about $600 a year – year after year. Unless you bought a Mac, or are geek enough to go without, you need to buy antiviral software. In theory you also need to $150 or so for Microsoft Office. And good luck with backup.

But that’s not the real cost.

The real cost is that you need an IQ-equivalent of 110 or higher, and a love of debugging and troubleshooting. For most of the population, that’s absolutely unaffordable.

PCs are very, very, expensive. The iPad 2.0, or its rivals to come, can be the poor person’s computer [4].

So Charlie got this one point wrong – but it only strengthens his overall argument. My four month old quad core iMac running 10.6 is an anachronism [2]. Its era is passing. Welcome to the third era of the personal computer.

[1] I thought things would blow up in 2009. Didn’t happen! Microsoft dropped the price of XP to about nothing and crawled back enough control of the netbook to stun the market (same thing they did with Palm in the 90s by the way). It’s still going to happen, but that’s not the first time I’ve been wrong on transition times. I’ve since learned to take my time estimates for technology transitions and triple them.

[2] Charlie also omits the role Digital Rights Management (DRM) plays in driving this transition. DRM is one of the reason there’s so much good software being produced for the iPhone. Your CDs may be worth money some day.

[3] Not least because of the pay-as-you-go capped data plan. That’s as big a deal as the device. Yes, I know iPad’s require a PC-as-peripheral, but that will change within the year.

[4] Of course that’s what the original Mac was – the “computer for the rest of us”. Closed architecture. All applications were to be vetted by Apple. Strict UI standards. Heavy investments in usability and design. Single button mouse. It worked too – it really was easy to use. Much easier to use than OS X. Almost as easy to use as the iPad. History doesn’t repeat, but sometimes it spirals.

Now that Adobe has moved on from trying to bring its services to Apple’s iPhone/iPod Touch, they are focusing most of their efforts towards Android. A public demo (once again) of Flash 10.1 is expected to make an appearance at this year’s I/O with the program finally being released in June. We’ll see how this turns out in June.

We look forward to delivering Flash Player 10.1 for Android smartphones as a public preview at Google I/O in May, and then a general release in June. From that point on, an ever increasing number and variety of powerful, Flash-enabled devices will be arriving which we hope will provide a great landscape of choice.

Froyo is expected to come with Flash integration. So if Flash is released in June, it may come as a part of Froyo at that time. So all you Nexus One owners can rejoice, you will surely receive this update first. The Droid and others should follow.

[via adobe]

With more than half of the companies in the S&P 500 having reported first quarter results, corporate profits have again come in well above consensus estimates. The normalization of credit conditions, a steep yield curve, improving prospects for global business and cost cutting made up much of the profit surprises.

As the economic recovery process deepens, cost cutting efforts are realized and global credit conditions thaw, analysts have responded by steadily increasing their earnings estimates.

While earnings are expected to accelerate further, the scope for further upside earnings surprises is waning, UBS Wealth Management Research warns. In contrast to this past year when analysts were playing catch up with the business cycle, most have now reset expectations and the bar has now been raised.

“With earnings revisions a key driver behind directional moves in equities, an absense of upside surprises should temper gains in stocks until year-end,” Michael Ryan and Stephen Freedman of UBS said in a report.

Despite the profit surge, they are sticking with a neutral (benchmark) tactical allocation in equities, an overweight in commodities, and below benchmark allocations to both fixed income and cash.

While market bears frequently point to the vulnerability of earnings estimates as a potential catalyst for a sharp pullback in equities, George Vasic noted that analysts have become more prudent over the years.

Despite what his colleagues noted, UBS Securities Canada's chief economist and strategist looked at the pattern of earnings revisions and found that it now takes far more economic weakness to generate the same earnings cuts as in the past.

“Accordingly, bears looking for earnings disappointment as the catalyst are either living in the past or expecting a very severe double dip for the economy,” he told clients.

With the economy representing a significant source of uncertainty, the magnitude of earnings revisions natural tracks GDP growth. But what investors may not have noticed is that the relationship between the two has shifted in recent years.

Mr. Vasic pointed out that in the past, it took an absolute boom in the economy for earnings estimates made at the beginning of the year to actually come to pass. However, in the new relationship, Mr. Vasic cited the example of the 30% cut to 2009 estimates as being consistent with a 2.6% drop in real GDP. He said the implication for investors is that 3% GDP growth in 2010 should only lead to modestly negative revisions. In the past, the strategist said this would have been consistent with a cut of more than 20%.

“Stated otherwise, it will likely require a major double dip in the economy to generate the earnings cuts envisioned by equity bears.”

Jonathan Ratner

The big macroeconomic news today is that the United States’ GDP grew at a 3.2 percent per year pace in the first quarter — the third straight quarter of strong growth, weaker than the 5.6 percent pace in the fourth quarter of 2009 and right in line with  economists’ expectations.

The Bureau of Economic Analysis cites growth in personal consumption (that is, consumer spending), private inventory investment (stores restocking their shelves), exports and nonresidential fixed investment (business purchases of things like wells, hotels, computer systems and plumbing) as the major factors accounting for the growth. Consumer spending increased at a 3.6 percent pace, the strongest in more than three years.

Of course, GDP is just one number among many. But its pace of growth slowing is a sign of how strong the headwinds remain as the government withdraws its crisis programs and unemployment remains high (a lag on GDP growth, because all those unemployed people are not producing much, nor are they consuming much). The stronger the growth, the faster the United States fills its output gap.

U.S. equity index futures are mixed this morning. S&P 500 futures are down 1 point in pre-opening trade. Index futures eased slightly following release of the advanced first quarter GDP report. Consensus was annualized real growth at a 3.3% rate. Actual was growth at a 3.2% rate.

Commodity prices including gold, crude oil, silver and copper are slightly higher following mild weakness in the U.S. Dollar Index.

Canada’s economy continues to grow at a satisfactory rate. Real GDP recorded a gain of 0.3% in February. Consensus was a gain of 0.3%. The Canadian Dollar was unchanged on the news.

First quarter earnings reports continue to surprise on the upside. Domtar and Chevron reported higher than consensus earnings.

Goldman Sachs fell 3% after Federal prosecutors confirmed that they were exploring the possibility of registering legal charges against the company.

Cenovus Energy slipped slightly after UBS downgraded the stock from Buy to Neutral. Target price is $31.

The U.S. oil services sector is trading lower after FBR Capital downgraded the sector. President Obama announced this morning that no new offshore drilling will be allowed until after the Gulf of Mexico oil spill disaster is investigated. 

Don Vialoux, chartered market technician, is the author of a free
daily report on equity markets, sectors, commodities, equities and
Exchange-Traded Funds. For more visit Don Vialoux's Web site 

Content: LOST PLANET 2 Multiplayer Demo
Price: Free
Availability: All Xbox LIVE regions except China
Dash Text: LOST PLANET returns with the long-awaited sequel to the 2 million-plus selling action shooter! LOST PLANET 2's all-new co-op feature allows up to 4 players to team up in Campaign Mode, forming new tactics and strategies to tackle situations that would be impossible alone. In this multiplayer demo, you and 15 other players battle it out on an all-new map, Turbulent Jungle. Choose from one of two modes popularized in the original LOST PLANET: Elimination or Post Grab. All the new VSs, weapons, and support items from the Campaign mode are also available in multiplayer. Grab your weapon of choice, plan out your attack, and get into the heat of battle with players from all over the world!

Add this demo to your Xbox 360 download queue

Like the demo? Pre-order the game here

Michael Giberson

In the course of making a point about current political actions pursued by some in the electric power industry, Rob Bradley points to the views of industry pioneer Samuel Insull:

Where did the drive for automatic pass-through of  “reasonable” costs begin? For the electric industry, it began in Chicago in June 1898 in a then-controversial speech by Samuel Insull, the head of Chicago Edison Company and the president of the major trade association of the industry, the National Electric Light Association.

Insull did not want regulation for its own sake. He believed that franchise protection was worth giving authorities control over rates. Insull believed that this quid-pro-quo — exclusive franchises for cost-based rate maximums — would lower interest costs (a huge cost item for public utilities) and thus lower rates. Insull also saw statewide public utility regulation as a better alternative to local politics and to municipalization.

Insull’s political program was ahead of its time. Most of his fellow electric utility heads were opposed when Insull first gave his speech. But he would win them over in the next years, and state-after-state would implement formal cost-of-service regulation for electricity.

Bradley then publishes in full Insull’s 1898 speech to the National Electric Light Association (the organization which became today’s Edison Electric Institute).

Check out Bradley’s post to see the speech, most of which is given to contrasting private and public management of resources and well worth reading.  For example, Insull asks, “Is the administration of municipal affairs in the various cities throughout this country so economical, as compared with the management of private industries, and the class of service rendered so efficient, as to justify the increasing of the burdens already imposed upon municipal government?”

It is a perhaps understandable failure of Insull’s analysis that he asserts the superior capabilities of private management in a competitive market setting to advocate private management in a state-regulated monopoly setting. Insull was, after all, able to expand his business and reduce cost and reduce prices pretty consistently throughout his career as a utility industry tycoon – both as a competitor and as a monopolist.

Doesn’t Juicy Couture make the cutest and most unique speakers? So instead of a dog or diamond gems this time around, they have taken on a new shape…”Sid” Teddy Bear Speaker. A Plush velour teddy that hides a speaker compatible with any MP3 player. This cute pink teddy pumps out the hits and gives you a pocket in the rear to hold your player. His arms and legs move making it easy to position him in any room to hear your music. “Sid” retails for $58.

Just when you thought the Florida Senate race drama had stabilized for a few hours, meet Jeff Greene. Greene, a real estate billionaire, is reportedly preparing to announce his candidacy today, just hours before the candidate filing deadline in Florida.

Sure, the guy has plenty of cash to fuel a last-minute campaign, but check out how he got all that money:

Greene earned more than $800 million by betting against the sub-prime mortgage market during the recent real estate boom. He’s been called “The Meltdown Mogul” and “The Reluctant Billionaire.”

I can almost hear the campaign commercials now…

If online media is supposed to be journalism’s white knight, it is taking its sweet time getting here.

AOL is hiring hundreds of journalists and so, on a somewhat smaller scale, is Yahoo. But despite the hype at a few big online outlets, the slowly thawing journalism job market is still dominated by legacy organizations like newspapers and magazines. Journalism schools and students know that newer companies will play a role in redefining journalism, and they’re trying to prepare for it with additional technical training, but the old guard still reigns.

“We still are doing a lot of business with all the people we were doing business with 30 years ago,” said Nicholas Lemann, the dean of Columbia’s Graduate School of Journalism. The new companies matter, he added, but “they don’t come across to
me as sort of the key variable in our life right now.”

The old guard has shrunk dramatically in recent years, as a once-lucrative business model has fallen prey to Internet economics. Daily papers shed 5,200 jobs last year, according to The American
Society of Newspaper Editors, which has conducted an
annual survey since 1978. The last three years were the worst in
the survey’s history, with 5,900 and 2,400 jobs lost in 2008 and 2007,
respectively. In 2009, the size of the workforce reached an all-time
low.

I don’t think it’s a big coincidence that we’re seeing all of these fossil fuel accidents after 8 years of lax oversight by Bush-Cheney (see The deadly toll of the ’safe’ and ‘clean’ coal and oil industries).  The fox was guarding the henhouse.  And in this case, the henhouse itself was not actually run by the hens.

An investment group with ties to labor pension funds called for the resignation of Massey Energy directors who are “ultimately responsible for Massey’s alarming safety compliance record.”  Brad Johnson has the story in this Wonk Room repost.

The Change to Win Investment Group “presented today an in-depth analysis to shareholders of Massey Energy Company, making the case to vote against the three directors up for election at the mining company’s May 18 annual meeting, the first meeting of shareholders since the tragic April 5 explosion at Massey’s Upper Big Branch mine in West Virginia, in which 29 miners lost their lives.” In a letter to investors, CtW called for the removal of directors responsible for the “preventable mine explosion” that “killed 29 miners and destroyed $1.1 billion in shareholder value“:

We urge you to vote “Withhold” on directors Richard M. Gabrys, Dan R. Moore and Baxter F. Phillips, Jr. at the Massey Energy Company annual meeting on May 18. As members of the Safety, Environmental and Public Policy Committee (SEPPC), these directors are ultimately responsible for serious and systematic non-compliance with mine safety laws over an extended period, a risk oversight failure that likely led to the catastrophic and preventable mine explosion on April 5 that killed 29 miners and destroyed $1.1 billion in shareholder value.

The investment group “believes Massey Chair and CEO Donald Blankenship’s ‘production first’ emphasis fostered a management culture that tolerated unacceptable safety and compliance failures.” By supporting Blankenship’s drive for profits over rules, the members of the Safety, Environmental and Public Policy Committee hold ultimate responsibility for the deaths of Massey’s miners.

Don Blankenship’s ‘Safety’ Overseers:

Richard Gabrys
On Massey’s board since 2007, Gabrys is “the retired vice chairman of Deloitte.” He also serves on the board of the Michigan-based companies La-Z-Boy Inc., coal-dependent utility CMS Energy, and engineering firm TriMas Corporation. Gabrys has given $6000 to Republicans, including $1000 to George W. Bush, and $500 to Rep. John Dingell (D-MI).

Dan R. Moore
On Massey’s board since 2002, Moore is “the Chairman of Moore Group, Inc., which owns multiple automobile dealerships in West Virginia and Kentucky.” He previously ran West Virginia’s Matewan Bank. Moore also serves on the board of the West Virginia University Foundation, the Branch Bank and Trust Company, and the West Virginia Housing Fund. Moore has contributed $8100 to Republicans since 2000.

Baxter F. Phillips
Massey’s president since 2008 and a top executive since 2000, Phillips joined Massey in 1981. Phillips has contributed $8900 to Republicans and $5950 to the Massey PAC.

On April 19, Massey director Lady Barbara Thomas Judge resigned amid shareholder unrest.

“During times like these, a change in senior management is not appropriate or in the best interest of our members and shareholders,” said Admiral Bobby R. Inman, Massey Energy’s lead independent director on April 22. “Therefore, we want to emphasize that Don Blankenship has the full support and confidence of the Massey Energy Board of Directors.”

KNOXVILLE — The four finalists for the job of director of the Howard H. Baker Jr. Center for Public Policy at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, will be visiting campus in May to complete their interviews and participate in public forums.

The schedule for the candidates’ public forums, all to be held in the Toyota Auditorium at the Baker Center, 1640 Cumberland Ave., is:

• May 5, 10:30 to 11:30 a.m. — Kenneth Richards, associate professor in the School of Public and Environmental Affairs and affiliated associate professor at Maurer School of Law at Indiana University in Bloomington, Ind.
• May 6, 1:30 to 2:30 p.m. — Christopher Hill, professor and director of the doctoral program in the School of Public Policy at George Mason University in Arlington, Va.
• May 10, 1:30 to 2:30 p.m. — Deborah Taylor Tate, former FCC commissioner and now a distinguished scholar at the Free State Foundation in Washington, D.C.
• May 19, 2 to 3 p.m. — Carl Pierce, W. Allen Separk Distinguished Professor of Law at UT Knoxville and interim director of the Baker Center.

“Having the Baker Center on our campus is a huge asset to UT Knoxville, our community, our state and our nation,” said Chancellor Jimmy G. Cheek. “Through the Baker Center, UT Knoxville has the opportunity to engage decision-makers about some of the most important issues facing our country, including health policy, global security, energy and environment, and governance studies. And, thanks to the influence of Sen. Howard Baker — who has been called the ‘Great Conciliator’ — we strive to do all of this through civil discourse.”

The Baker Center director will report to the UT chancellor and work closely with Sen. Baker, UT deans and faculty, and with Oak Ridge National Laboratory. The director will be expected to develop national visibility and an international reputation for the center, a strong research base in public policy and an interdisciplinary academic program in public policy drawing upon the resources of the university, ORNL, the Knoxville community and the state of Tennessee.

The director will oversee the development of public programs on important public policy topics with nationally known speakers and experts; advance public policy and civics education, and create programs and materials to help teachers; establish nationwide partnerships and provide leadership among congressional centers; develop and maintain first-rate political archives, including an oral history program, and make them accessible to scholars and the public; coordinate fundraising for the center; be a spokesperson for the center with community groups, the media, and at conferences and other events; and promote the museum as an educational resource for the public.

Requirements for the job include a doctorate in an academic discipline related to public policy development or an appropriate terminal degree and equivalent experience with a strong record of achievement; an understanding of the mission of higher education and scholarship; experience in fiscal management; the ability to interact with a diverse and multicultural community; strong written and public speaking skills; and the capacity to develop a five- to 10-year vision for the center.

College of Business Administrator Dean Jan Williams is chairing the committee searching for the Baker Center director.

The Baker Center, which opened at UT in 2003, is a public policy institute integrating research, education, public programming and archives. It develops programs and promotes research to further the public’s knowledge of our system of governance, and to highlight the critical importance of public service, a hallmark of Sen. Baker’s career.

The center opened its new $17 million facility in October 2008. The 53,000-square-foot facility was funded entirely by private dollars and includes the Modern Political Archives, which hold more than 100 collections of political papers from prominent Tennessee leaders. The museum tells the story of how government works using Sen. Baker’s life as a backdrop, explores modern Tennessee politics and engages students and adults in interactive exhibits. A 200-seat auditorium provides a setting for programs, classrooms and break-out rooms for instruction and conferences

For more about the Baker Center, see http://bakercenter.utk.edu/main/. For more about the director candidates, see http://bakercenter.utk.edu/main/search-finalists.php.

C O N T A C T :

Amy Blakely (865-974-5034, [email protected])

Foi revelado pela Hyundai durante o Salão do Automóvel de Busan, na Coréia do Sul o novo Elantra versão 2011 (vendido na Asia como Avante). O novo modelo terá um motor 1.6 de quatro cilindros a gasolina e 138 cv, e transmissão automática de seis marchas.

O novo sedan chegará no mercado norte-americano no final desse ano e no mercado coreano no início do segundo semestre. Entre as mudanças do carro estão os assentos traseiros com sistema de aquecimento, faróis de neblina e uma tela de LCD com várias informações.

Vejam o vídeo da apresentação do novo Elantra logo abaixo, mostrando alguns detalhes da sua aerodinâmica. Fica a dica para um carro moderno e estiloso para o futuro.

Imagens do novo sedan

Via | Inside Line