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2009-08-11T12:04:00.000-07:00

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death insurance

2009-08-11T11:44:00.000-07:00

Death insurance, or Burial Insurance as it is more commonly known, is a way of making sure that your funeral costs are taken care of before the event comes. It is a way of preparing yourself for the inevitable whilst making sure that loved ones are not left with the responsibility. You will find many options when it comes to insurance relating to life and death and it certainly pays to find out more about them.
Basic death insurance means that you can make sure that at the very least your funeral is all paid for before you leave this earth. A policy known as Pre-Need Insurance is available which is specifically designed for this purpose. They are available through funeral homes and it is these homes that are the beneficiary of the policy. This ensures that the funds are paying the funeral costs and nothing else.
Other types of death insurance include the option of getting a lump sum paid to any named beneficiary in the event of your death. The difference between these types of policies and the Pre-Need Insurance is that the funds are not specifically allocated to the costs of a funeral. If you still have money owing to others after you pass on, the funds from these policies can be used to pay these debts off. Items associated with death including medical bills and nursing home fees could be paid off in full. Commonly these policies are called simply Burial Insurance or Final Expense Insurance.
The advantage of these types of policies is that you pick the person who receives the death benefit. It could be a spouse, colleague, your children or a friend. It is recommended that after taking out a policy, you discuss with the beneficiary where you would like the funds to be allocated. You may have specific requests about who should be given a payment from the monies received. It is worth noting that the beneficiary will be given the money to use as they see fit unless you do this. Also, any cash that is left over belongs to the named person themselves.
If you decide to name any of your children as the beneficiary or take out a single life policy, insurers recommend that you hold the policy in some form of trust. This is mainly to take care of any matters that rise in relation to tax, which can be important where children are beneficiaries. You can take out a joint policy for you and your partner; however, check with the insurer as they may only pay out after the first death and not the second.
In respect of death insurance policies there are two main options to pick from. You could have Term Life Insurance; this basically means that the policy will run for a set period of time. If there are no claims made due to death during this time, then the policy ceases to continue. Whole Life Insurance is a policy that will run up until the event of your death and is not limited to a set timescale. Generally speaking, the premiums for the latter option are a bit more than that of the former option.
Getting death insurance is very easy and can be done in person, on the telephone or via the internet. Many insurance agents and companies have their own websites where you can fill in a quick application form. Depending on the type of policy you are after, you may not need to provide any details of your medical history or undergo an examination by a physician.
Purchasing death insurance is really something you should think about before you get too old. It will contribute to a better quality of life; knowing that the funeral costs arrangements are all taken care of will be a weight off of your shoulders.
FuneralInsuranceCost.com is the Internet's premier resource for burial insurance, with facts and articles on topics such as funeral cost, and much more. Click the links above for more information!

acne

2009-08-11T11:32:00.000-07:00

What is acne? What are the different types of acne?
Acne (acne vulgaris, common acne) is not just a problem for teenagers; it can affect people from ages 10 through 40. It is not unusual for women, in particular, to develop acne in their mid- to late-20s, even if they have not had breakouts in years (or ever). On the positive side, those few individuals who have acne into their 40s may well grow out of it. Acne can appear on the skin as any of the following:
congested pores ("comedones"),
whiteheads,
blackheads,
pimples ("zits"),
pustules, or
cysts (deep pimples, boils). The pus in pustules and cysts is sterile and does not actually contain infectious bacteria.
These blemishes occur wherever there are many oil (sebaceous) glands, mainly on the face, chest, and back.
You can do a lot to treat your acne using products available at a drugstore or cosmetic counter that do not require a prescription. However, for tougher cases of acne, you should consult a physician for treatment options.

What causes acne?
No one factor causes acne. Acne happens when oil (sebaceous) glands come to life around puberty, stimulated by male hormones from the adrenal glands of both boys and girls. Sebum (oil) is a natural substance which lubricates and protects the skin, and under certain circumstances, cells that are close to the surface block the openings of sebaceous glands and cause a buildup of oil underneath. This oil stimulates bacteria (which live on everyone's skin and generally cause no problems) to multiply and cause surrounding tissues to become inflamed.
Inflammation near the skin's surface produces a pustule; deeper inflammation results in a papule (pimple); deeper still and it's a cyst. If the oil breaks though to the surface, the result is a "whitehead." If the oil accumulates melanin pigment or becomes oxidized, the oil changes from white to black, and the result is a "blackhead." Blackheads are therefore not dirt, and do not reflect poor hygiene.
Here are some factors that don't usually cause acne, at least by themselves:
Heredity: With the exception of very severe acne, most people do not have the problem exactly as their parents did. Almost everyone has some acne at some point in their life.
Food: Parents often tell teens to avoid pizza, chocolate, greasy and fried foods, and junk food. While these foods may not be good for overall health, they don't cause acne or make it worse. Although some recent studies have implicated milk and dairy products in aggravating acne, these findings are far from established.
Dirt: As mentioned above, "blackheads" are oxidized oil, not dirt. Sweat does not cause acne, therefore, it is not necessary to shower instantly after exercise for fear that sweat will clog pores. On the other hand, excessive washing can dry and irritate the skin.
Stress: Some people get so upset by their pimples that they pick at them and make them last longer. Stress, however, does not play much of a direct role in causing acne.
Hormones: Some women break out cyclically, but most women (and men) don't. Some oral contraceptive pills may help relieve acne, but unless a woman has abnormal menstrual periods and excessive hair growth, it's unlikely that hormones play much of a role in causing acne. Pregnancy has a variable effect on acne; some women report that they clear up completely, and others get worse, while many others see no overall change.
Cosmetics: Most cosmetic and skin-care products are not pore-clogging ("comedogenic"). Of the many available brands, those which are listed as "water-based" or "oil-free" are generally a better choice.
In occasional patients, the following may be contributing factors:
Pressure: In some patients, pressure from helmets, chinstraps, collars, suspenders, and the like can aggravate acne.
Drugs: Some medications may cause or worsen acne, such as those containing iodides, bromides, or oral or injected steroids (either the medically prescribed prednisone or the steroids that bodybuilders or athletes take). Other drugs that can cause or aggravate acne are anticonvulsant medications and lithium, which is used to treat bipolar disorder. Most cases of acne, however, are not drug-related.

insurance

2009-08-11T11:30:00.000-07:00

Insurance Information
The Internet was created to decimate information. It is the perfect place to find insurance information on a variety of insurance types.You can get a complete picture of the benefits offered and determine the value of those benefits. Insurance, being intangible in nature, requires a study of available information and an idea of what is desired for coverage. The more research you do the better idea you will have of what you want. As you know, we often want maximum benefits, but often can only afford what is truly needed. Insurance is defined as " a transfer of risk ”. The insurance companies are agreeing to accept your risk in return for a specified amount of funds. This is called the premium. The richer the benefits are, the greater the risk will be to the insurance company, so the higher the premium. This site is designed with you in mind. You are just like us, while doing research for a desired product or service, we want good information that will help us be informed and feel confident about our decisions. The insurance information on this site is the best we can find and we hope it properly serves your needs. Do your research there's a lot of information here. Be sure to read the plan outlines and descriptions, match up benefits and quotes and if the company offering your desired plan is solid, you're set. We have also worked hard to provide the best recommendations for insurance providers and brokers. May they serve you well.

catagories

2009-08-09T02:24:00.001-07:00

vioxx attorney

2009-08-09T02:14:00.001-07:00

Contact a Vioxx Attorney Today
An experienced Vioxx attorney can help you decide the best methods by which to protect yourself and your family. Vioxx lawyers understand the medical risks posed by this drug, and the severity of its side effects. A Vioxx lawyer will usually provide a free consultation to determine whether you have a viable case; many Vioxx lawyers prefer if you bring any available medical information to this consultation. If your case qualifies, Vioxx lawyers will work with your doctor to ensure that you are properly represented and protected. Vioxx lawyers are available in almost every part of the country. Use this site to search for and find an attorney near you...MORE
Vioxx Alert - 27,000 Victims
Merck & Co.’s arthritis drug Vioxx may have led to more than 27,000 heart attacks and sudden cardiac deaths before it was pulled from the market last week, the Wall Street Journal reported Wednesday, citing an unreleased study by government regulators.
Last week, Merck abruptly recalled Vioxx, an arthritis treatment and one of the company’s top-selling drugs, after an internal study showed that patients taking the drug were more likely to suffer a cardiac event than those taking a placebo.
The Journal’s report, citing a study by the Food and Drug Administration, said that from Vioxx’s approval in 1999 through 2003, an estimated 27,785 heart attacks and sudden cardiac deaths would have been avoided if Celebrex, a competing drug made by Pfizer Inc., had been used instead of Vioxx

tax attorney

2009-08-09T02:13:00.001-07:00

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When a taxpayer has problems with the Internal Revenue Service, or the state department of revenue, he may be able to solve it himself. However, with the intricacies of U.S. tax law being what they are, the taxpayer may find himself better served in hiring a tax attorney.

A tax attorney specializes in working with taxpayers to solve their problems with the IRS or state revenue department. In fact, they generally focus only on tax issues and relief. A tax attorney can help a taxpayer in trouble make it through an audit, have fines reduced, liens removed, and can navigate through the minefield of small business and self-employment tax issues.

Many small business owners consider their tax attorney to be as vital as their accountant. This is because a good tax attorney can help head off tax problems before they even begin. He or she can see potential trouble spots for a business and can advise the owner how to avoid them.

U.S. tax law is not only labyrinthine in structure, it also changes nearly every year. Thus, a good tax attorney will keep up with the latest changes and can advise clients accordingly. A tax attorney may also be helpful when setting up trust funds, stock portfolios and the like, so a taxpayer doesn't run into unexpected surprises on April 15.

A person looking for a tax attorney shouldn't call the first one listed in the phone book. He should look around, ask friends, or even his personal attorney (if he has one) to recommend a good tax specialist. As a prospective client, the taxpayer should look for a tax attorney with extensive experience in dealing with the IRS, in debt management cases, and in working with real live taxpayers. He should also ask the attorney for references. The taxpayer should also make certain his tax attorney is a member of the American Bar Association and the state bar association. A client should also make sure he knows what his attorney's rates are, and make arrangements for payment early on in the consultation process.

If a taxpayer finds himself in over his head where the IRS is concerned, he should certainly consult a tax attorney. Tax fines tend to snowball, and it is always in the taxpayer's best interests to get problems solved while they are still relatively small ones. Waiting until the last minute to see a tax attorney could be extremely costly, and might result in jail time for the taxpayer, as well as higher legal fees.

Money invested in the services of a tax attorney can be considered a wise investment for a taxpayer.

american singles dating

2009-08-09T02:09:00.000-07:00

We are living in an electronic world, getting to know each other online is common. There are many free dating services online these days but selecting the best free dating sites is not easy. We believe that we are the free dating service you are looking for. Our free dating service offer easy two-step registration and 100% free to contact with other online singles. However, we are not an adult dating service so please do not post any adult pictures on our free dating web site. We are totally free online dating site so join us today to find your other half. Good luck and have a great time!

primary pulmonary hypertension

2009-08-09T02:07:00.000-07:00

Background

Primary pulmonary hypertension (PPH) is a rare disease characterized by elevated pulmonary artery pressure with no apparent cause. PPH is also termed precapillary pulmonary hypertension or, more recently, idiopathic pulmonary arterial hypertension (IPAH). The diagnosis is usually made after excluding other known causes of pulmonary hypertension. Dresdale and colleagues first reported a hemodynamic account of IPAH in 1951. For additional resources, please visit Pulmonary Arterial Hypertension.

Pathophysiology

The pathophysiology of IPAH is poorly understood. An insult (eg, hormonal, mechanical, other) to the endothelium may occur, possibly in the setting of increased susceptibility to pulmonary vascular injury (ie, multiple hit theory), resulting in a cascade of events characterized by vascular scarring, endothelial dysfunction, and intimal and medial (smooth muscle) proliferation. At least 15-20% of patients with IPAH have a familial form, which has only recently been characterized. Some cases may be related to sporadic genetic defects. The most common genetic defect in these cases is related to the BMPR-II gene.

Early in the disease, as the pulmonary artery pressure increases because of increasing right ventricle work, thrombotic pulmonary arteriopathy occurs. Thrombotic pulmonary arteriopathy is characterized by in situ thrombosis of small muscular arteries of the pulmonary vasculature. In later stages, as the pulmonary pressure continues to rise, plexogenic pulmonary arteriopathy develops. This is characterized by a remodeling of the pulmonary vasculature with intimal fibrosis and replacement of normal endothelial structure.

Associated conditions

IPAH can be associated with portal hypertension (sometimes called portopulmonary hypertension), suggesting that patients with shunting of splanchnic blood, with or without liver disease, have a higher risk of developing PPH. Additionally, exposure of the pulmonary circulation to substances in the splanchnic circulation that normally are detoxified via the liver may contribute to the development of pulmonary hypertension. More research is necessary to better understand this relationship.

Patients with connective tissue diseases, namely the CREST (calcinosis cutis, Raynaud phenomenon, esophageal motility disorder, sclerodactyly, and telangiectasia) variant of scleroderma, systemic lupus erythematosus, and mixed connective tissue disease, are also predisposed to developing IPAH-like disease. This is now termed associated PAH, or APAH. However, the pathophysiologic nature of this predisposition is unclear. In the past, most experts used the term secondary pulmonary arterial hypertension for these diseases, indicating that, similar to IPAH, the process involves the precapillary circulation but is somehow caused by the underlying disease.

Other associations with IPAH include exposure to anorexigens and other alpha-adrenergic stimulants (eg, cocaine, amphetamines) and HIV seropositivity. How these associated conditions predispose to or cause PPH remains unknown.

In most cases of APAH, such as in connective tissue disease, the incidence of pulmonary hypertension is higher (>10% in some studies) than for IPAH, which has an incidence of 1-2 cases per million per year (see below).

Frequency

United States

IPAH is responsible for approximately 125-150 deaths per year and has an incidence rate of approximately 1-3 cases per million population per year. The incidence and prevalence of IPAH are considerably higher than those for pure IPAH.

International

The worldwide incidence of IPAH approximates that observed in the United States.

Mortality/Morbidity

IPAH has no cure. Untreated, IPAH leads to right-sided heart failure and death. The overall survival rate in one study was approximately 30% at 3 years. Prior to the 1990s, therapeutic options were limited. The recent emergence of prostacyclin analogues, endothelin receptor antagonists, and other novel drug therapies has greatly improved the outlook for patients with IPAH and IPAH-like diseases. In one study, the use of long-term prostacyclin agents resulted in a 5-year mortality rate greater than 65%. With newer therapies, perhaps in combination, these figures are expected to further improve.

Race

No racial predilection is recognized.

Sex

IPAH occurs at a female-to-male ratio ranging from 2-9:1, depending on the treatment center sampled; however, the reasons for this female predilection remain unknown.

Age

Typically, younger women of childbearing age develop IPAH. However, it can also affect women in their fifth and sixth decades of life or older.

Clinical

History

The average time from symptom onset to diagnosis has been reported to be approximately 2 years. Despite recent attempts at increasing the awareness of PAH, especially APAH, this delay in diagnosis has not changed appreciably in recent years.

Early symptoms are nonspecific. Often, neither the patient nor physician recognizes the presence of the disease, which leads to delays in diagnosis. Complicating matters, PPH requires an extensive workup in an attempt to elucidate an identifiable cause of the elevated pulmonary artery pressure.
The most common symptoms reported in a national prospective study are as follows:
- Dyspnea is present in 60%.
- Weakness is present in 19%.
- Recurrent syncope is present in 13%.
- Women are more likely to be symptomatic than men.

Physical

Physical findings in persons with PAH can be quite variable.

Physical examination of the cardiovascular system often reveals the following findings:
- The pulmonic component of the second heart sound is usually increased, which may demonstrate fixed or paradoxic splitting in the presence of severe right ventricular dysfunction. Occasionally, the second heart sound may be palpable.
- Pulmonic regurgitation (Graham Steell murmur) may also be apparent.
- A murmur of tricuspid regurgitation can be present, and a right ventricular lift (heave) may be noted.
- Jugular venous pulsations may be elevated in the presence of volume overload, right ventricular failure, or both. Large V waves are often present because of the commonly present severe tricuspid regurgitation.
Other findings may include (1) hepatomegaly with palpable pulsations of the liver and (2) an abnormal abdominal-jugular reflex. Ascites is not uncommonly present in untreated patients or in patients with worsening decompensated right heart failure.
Lung examination findings are usually normal.
Extremity examination may reveal pitting edema of varying degrees. Patients who are bedridden may have presacral edema.

Causes

The strict definition of IPAH is pulmonary hypertension with no known cause. However, associations have been recognized (eg, liver cirrhosis, stimulant abuse, HIV infection; see Associated conditions in Pathophysiology).

mesothelioma information

2009-08-09T02:06:00.000-07:00

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What is the mesothelium?

The mesothelium is a membrane that covers and protects most of the internal organs of the body. It is composed of two layers of cells: One layer immediately surrounds the organ; the other forms a sac around it. The mesothelium produces a lubricating fluid that is released between these layers, allowing moving organs (such as the beating heart and the expanding and contracting lungs) to glide easily against adjacent structures.

The mesothelium has different names, depending on its location in the body. The peritoneum is the mesothelial tissue that covers most of the organs in the abdominal cavity. The pleura is the membrane that surrounds the lungs and lines the wall of the chest cavity. The pericardium covers and protects the heart. The mesothelial tissue surrounding the male internal reproductive organs is called the tunica vaginalis testis. The tunica serosa uteri covers the internal reproductive organs in women.

What is mesothelioma?

Mesothelioma (cancer of the mesothelium) is a disease in which cells of the mesothelium become abnormal and divide without control or order. They can invade and damage nearby tissues and organs. Cancer cells can also metastasize (spread) from their original site to other parts of the body. Most cases of mesothelioma begin in the pleura or peritoneum.

How common is mesothelioma?

Although reported incidence rates have increased in the past 20 years, mesothelioma is still a relatively rare cancer. About 2,000 new cases of mesothelioma are diagnosed in the United States each year. Mesothelioma occurs more often in men than in women and risk increases with age, but this disease can appear in either men or women at any age.

What are the risk factors for mesothelioma?

Working with asbestos is the major risk factor for mesothelioma. A history of asbestos exposure at work is reported in about 70 percent to 80 percent of all cases. However, mesothelioma has been reported in some individuals without any known exposure to asbestos.

Asbestos is the name of a group of minerals that occur naturally as masses of strong, flexible fibers that can be separated into thin threads and woven. Asbestos has been widely used in many industrial products, including cement, brake linings, roof shingles, flooring products, textiles, and insulation. If tiny asbestos particles float in the air, especially during the manufacturing process, they may be inhaled or swallowed, and can cause serious health problems. In addition to mesothelioma, exposure to asbestos increases the risk of lung cancer, asbestosis (a noncancerous, chronic lung ailment), and other cancers, such as those of the larynx and kidney.

Smoking does not appear to increase the risk of mesothelioma. However, the combination of smoking and asbestos exposure significantly increases a person's risk of developing cancer of the air passageways in the lung.

Who is at increased risk for developing mesothelioma?

Asbestos has been mined and used commercially since the late 1800s. Its use greatly increased during World War II. Since the early 1940s, millions of American workers have been exposed to asbestos dust. Initially, the risks associated with asbestos exposure were not known. However, an increased risk of developing mesothelioma was later found among shipyard workers, people who work in asbestos mines and mills, producers of asbestos products, workers in the heating and construction industries, and other tradespeople. Today, the U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) sets limits for acceptable levels of asbestos exposure in the workplace. People who work with asbestos wear personal protective equipment to lower their risk of exposure.

The risk of asbestos-related disease increases with heavier exposure to asbestos and longer exposure time. However, some individuals with only brief exposures have developed mesothelioma. On the other hand, not all workers who are heavily exposed develop asbestos-related diseases.

There is some evidence that family members and others living with asbestos workers have an increased risk of developing mesothelioma, and possibly other asbestos-related diseases. This risk may be the result of exposure to asbestos dust brought home on the clothing and hair of asbestos workers. To reduce the chance of exposing family members to asbestos fibers, asbestos workers are usually required to shower and change their clothing before leaving the workplace.

What are the symptoms of mesothelioma?

Symptoms of mesothelioma may not appear until 30 to 50 years after exposure to asbestos. Shortness of breath and pain in the chest due to an accumulation of fluid in the pleura are often symptoms of pleural mesothelioma. Symptoms of peritoneal mesothelioma include weight loss and abdominal pain and swelling due to a buildup of fluid in the abdomen. Other symptoms of peritoneal mesothelioma may include bowel obstruction, blood clotting abnormalities, anemia, and fever. If the cancer has spread beyond the mesothelium to other parts of the body, symptoms may include pain, trouble swallowing, or swelling of the neck or face.

These symptoms may be caused by mesothelioma or by other, less serious conditions. It is important to see a doctor about any of these symptoms. Only a doctor can make a diagnosis.

How is mesothelioma diagnosed?

Diagnosing mesothelioma is often difficult, because the symptoms are similar to those of a number of other conditions. Diagnosis begins with a review of the patient's medical history, including any history of asbestos exposure. A complete physical examination may be performed, including x-rays of the chest or abdomen and lung function tests. A CT (or CAT) scan or an MRI may also be useful. A CT scan is a series of detailed pictures of areas inside the body created by a computer linked to an x-ray machine. In an MRI, a powerful magnet linked to a computer is used to make detailed pictures of areas inside the body. These pictures are viewed on a monitor and can also be printed.

A biopsy is needed to confirm a diagnosis of mesothelioma. In a biopsy, a surgeon or a medical oncologist (a doctor who specializes in diagnosing and treating cancer) removes a sample of tissue for examination under a microscope by a pathologist. A biopsy may be done in different ways, depending on where the abnormal area is located. If the cancer is in the chest, the doctor may perform a thoracoscopy. In this procedure, the doctor makes a small cut through the chest wall and puts a thin, lighted tube called a thoracoscope into the chest between two ribs. Thoracoscopy allows the doctor to look inside the chest and obtain tissue samples. If the cancer is in the abdomen, the doctor may perform a peritoneoscopy. To obtain tissue for examination, the doctor makes a small opening in the abdomen and inserts a special instrument called a peritoneoscope into the abdominal cavity. If these procedures do not yield enough tissue, more extensive diagnostic surgery may be necessary.

If the diagnosis is mesothelioma, the doctor will want to learn the stage (or extent) of the disease. Staging involves more tests in a careful attempt to find out whether the cancer has spread and, if so, to which parts of the body. Knowing the stage of the disease helps the doctor plan treatment.

Mesothelioma is described as localized if the cancer is found only on the membrane surface where it originated. It is classified as advanced if it has spread beyond the original membrane surface to other parts of the body, such as the lymph nodes, lungs, chest wall, or abdominal organs.

How is mesothelioma treated?

Treatment for mesothelioma depends on the location of the cancer, the stage of the disease, and the patient's age and general health. Standard treatment options include surgery, radiation therapy, and chemotherapy. Sometimes, these treatments are combined.

Surgery is a common treatment for mesothelioma. The doctor may remove part of the lining of the chest or abdomen and some of the tissue around it. For cancer of the pleura (pleural mesothelioma), a lung may be removed in an operation called a pneumonectomy. Sometimes part of the diaphragm, the muscle below the lungs that helps with breathing, is also removed.

Radiation therapy, also called radiotherapy, involves the use of high-energy rays to kill cancer cells and shrink tumors. Radiation therapy affects the cancer cells only in the treated area. The radiation may come from a machine (external radiation) or from putting materials that produce radiation through thin plastic tubes into the area where the cancer cells are found (internal radiation therapy).

Chemotherapy is the use of anticancer drugs to kill cancer cells throughout the body. Most drugs used to treat mesothelioma are given by injection into a vein (intravenous, or IV). Doctors are also studying the effectiveness of putting chemotherapy directly into the chest or abdomen (intracavitary chemotherapy).

To relieve symptoms and control pain, the doctor may use a needle or a thin tube to drain fluid that has built up in the chest or abdomen. The procedure for removing fluid from the chest is called thoracentesis. Removal of fluid from the abdomen is called paracentesis. Drugs may be given through a tube in the chest to prevent more fluid from accumulating. Radiation therapy and surgery may also be helpful in relieving symptoms.

Are new treatments for mesothelioma being studied?

Yes. Because mesothelioma is very hard to control, the National Cancer Institute (NCI) is sponsoring clinical trials (research studies with people) that are designed to find new treatments and better ways to use current treatments. Before any new treatment can be recommended for general use, doctors conduct clinical trials to find out whether the treatment is safe for patients and effective against the disease. Participation in clinical trials is an important treatment option for many patients with mesothelioma.

People interested in taking part in a clinical trial should talk with their doctor. Information about clinical trials is available from the Cancer Information Service (CIS) (see below) at 1–800–4–CANCER. Information specialists at the CIS use PDQ®, NCI's cancer information database, to identify and provide detailed information about specific ongoing clinical trials. Patients also have the option of searching for clinical trials on their own. The clinical trials page on the NCI's Cancer.gov Web site, located at http://www.cancer.gov/clinicaltrials on the Internet, provides general information about clinical trials and links to PDQ.

People considering clinical trials may be interested in the NCI booklet Taking Part in Cancer Treatment Research Studies. This booklet describes how research studies are carried out and explains their possible benefits and risks. The booklet is available by calling the CIS, or from the NCI Publications Locator Web site at http://www.cancer.gov/publications on the Internet.

benchmark lending

2009-08-09T02:05:00.000-07:00

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Benchmark Lending Group
Benchmark Lending Group is a direct mortgage lender, enabling you to quickly secure a new home mortgage or refinance your existing one. Offering a broad range of mortgages ensures that we provide you with a solution that is specifically tailored to your needs. Our mission is to earn your trust, meet your financial goals and provide an outstanding customer experience. And guess what, we´re nice people too!
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dc hair laser removal washington

2009-08-09T02:04:00.000-07:00

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Laser Hair Removal Washington DC

Laser hair removal in Washington DC is quickly becoming one of the most popular cosmetic procedures for both men and women. If you are sick and tired of shaving, waxing, or tweezing unwanted hair on a daily or weekly basis, and are looking for a more permanent solution, we have exactly what you need. Many men and women are turning to the latest trend in hair removal - the laser. For those interested in our revolutionary non-invasive procedure, here are all the facts that you need to know before you go under the light. This procedure has been hyped around the globe as the permanent solution to unwanted hair removal and has shown great promise in delivering on that claim. However, before investing your valuable time and hard earned money into Laser Hair Removal treatments, we suggest you do a little research.

The effect of removing unwanted hair by laser was first discovered by dermatologists in the late 1960s. Dermatologists discovered that during treatment for skin conditions with lasers, the removal of hair in the treatment area happened to be a side effect and because of this, lasers have been studied extensively for years for their hair removal effectiveness. Many different types of lasers have since been approved by the FDA and now professional treatments for Laser Hair Removal in Washington DC are available to all interested residents.

Today, Laser Hair Removal in Washington DC is one of the fastest growing non-invasive cosmetic procedures on the market. Last year alone, over one million individuals underwent laser treatments around the globe. At our Washington DC clinic, all of the technicians are trained and certified on the latest laser hair removal equipment; this guarantees professional Laser Hair Removal treatments each and every time you visit. To learn more about our approach to this extraordinary treatment, come in for a free and confidential consultation. We’ll give you all the information you need and get you set up for a series of Laser Hair Removal treatments at our Washington DC clinic that will leave you with nothing but hair free skin!

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2009-08-09T02:02:00.000-07:00

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catagories

2009-08-07T12:50:00.001-07:00

mortgage

catagories
credit reports
loans
lawyers
insurance policy
structured settlements
asbetos lawsuit
mesothelioma lawyers
mesothelioma help
attorney
Mesothelioma Lawyers

mortgage

2009-08-07T12:48:00.000-07:00

mortgage mortgage mortgage mortgage mortgage mortgage mortgage mortgage mortgage mortgage mortgage mortgage mortgage mortgage mortgage mortgage mortgage mortgage mortgage mortgage mortgage mortgage mortgage mortgage mortgage

Mortgage lender

A mortgage lender is an investor that lends money secured by a mortgage on real estate. Typically, the purpose of the loan is for the borrower to purchase that same real estate. The borrower, known as the mortgagor, gives the mortgage to the lender, known as the mortgagee. As the mortgagee, the lender has the right to sell the property to pay off the loan if the borrower fails to pay.

The mortgage runs with the land, so even if the borrower transfers the property to someone else, the mortgagee still has the right to sell it if the borrower fails to pay off the loan.

So that a buyer cannot unwittingly buy property subject to a mortgage, mortgages are registered recorded against the title with a government office, as a public record. The borrower has the right to have the mortgage dischareged from the title once the debt is paid.

catagories

2009-08-04T12:41:00.001-07:00

attorney law

2009-08-04T12:38:00.000-07:00

attorney law attorney law attorney law attorney law attorney law attorney law attorney law attorney law attorney law attorney law attorney law attorney law attorney law attorney law attorney law attorney law attorney law attorney law attorney law attorney law attorney law attorney law attorney law attorney law attorney law attorney law attorney law attorney law attorney law attorney law attorney law attorney law attorney law attorney law

An attorney at law (or attorney-at-law) in the United States is a practitioner in a court of law who is legally qualified to prosecute and defend actions in such court on the retainer of clients. Alternative terms include counselor (or counsellor-at-law) and lawyer.[1]

The United States legal system does not draw a distinction between lawyers who plead in court and those who do not, unlike many other common law jurisdictions (such as Britain, which has distinct between solicitors and barrister -or, in Scotland, advocates) or and civil law jurisdictions (such as Italy and France, which distinguish between advocates and civil law notaries). An additional factor which differentiates the American legal system from other countries is that there is no delegation of routine work to notaries public or their civil law notaries (their civil law equivalent).

Attorneys may use the post-nominal letters Esq., the abbreviated form of the word Esquire.

Contents [hide]
1 Practice of law
2 Media images
3 Specialization
4 Control of cases
5 Education and training
5.1 Avenues to becoming a lawyer
5.2 Degrees in law
5.3 Law students in court
5.3.1 Illinois: The 711 license
6 Unlicensed practice of law
7 Attire
8 Alternatives to the practice of law
9 See also
10 Notes
11 External links
11.1 United States

[edit] Practice of law
Main article: Practice of law
Once admitted to practice by the highest court of a state, (the state supreme court), a function sometimes administered by the state's bar association, an American attorney may file legal pleadings and argue cases in any state court, provide legal advice to clients and draft important legal instruments such as wills, trusts, deeds and contracts. Arguing cases in the federal courts usually requires separate admission.

In some states, real estate closings may be performed only by attorneys, even though the attorney's role in a closing may involve primarily notarization of documents and disbursement of settlement funds through an escrow account.

Actions that may be performed by lawyers are referred to as the practice of law. Practicing law includes interviewing a client to identify the legal question, analyzing the question, researching relevant law, devising legal solutions to problems and executing such solutions through specific tasks such as drafting a contract or filing a motion with a court.

Most academic legal training is directed to identifying legal issues, researching facts and law as well as arguing both the facts and law in favor of either side in any case.

For several years, law schools have sent through far more students than new job openings have become available. This leads to attorneys (once they pass the bar) seeking work in other occupations, either by choice or by the lack of employment opportunities. This has led to a market in legal temps or contract attorneys, where attorneys spend a certain period of time working on tasks such as discovery for a case.

[edit] Media images
Contrary to the media image of attorneys, a great deal of litigation and regulatory legal work is spent conducting research in a law library or in an electronic database like Westlaw, LexisNexis or Bloomberg L.P. Many attorneys also spend a large portion of their working time drafting documents, such as legal briefs, contracts, wills and trusts. Few television programs and movies accurately portray the hours for tasks forming the core of the occupational life of many attorneys.

One occasional exception is the television program Law & Order, which sometimes shows the main characters researching at a computer late into the night (always using Westlaw, due to a contract between Westlaw and the show's producers). Some episodes also show lawyers keeping a small rack of clothes in their office for those times when research lasts all night and the character does not have time to go home to change.

Another notable portrayal of the profession was the series Murder One which featured a group of lawyers as central characters. The Practice did as well, but its accuracy may be questionable.[citation needed]

Movies and television also generally show attorneys focused on a single case. Most litigators have many cases in progress at any given time. Each case has deadlines that must be carefully monitored and court dates which one must not forget. Because they often balance many cases at once, attorneys that litigate often have difficult working lives when important documents must be drafted or other work must be performed on different cases at one time.[citation needed]

In litigation, attorneys spend much time discovering the facts of the case to develop a "theory of the case" that integrates facts and law in a way most favorable to their client. Many attorneys believe[weasel words] that the discovery process has reduced the number of civil cases that actually go to trial since the discovery process often allows for a clear evaluation of the merits of each side's position.

Some attorneys are not trial lawyers. Non-trial attorneys are sometimes called transactional lawyers or corporate lawyers. They specialize in activities that seldom involve them in litigation. Among these activities are writing legal opinion letters, drafting wills or trust documents, advising clients, structuring business transactions, negotiating and drafting contracts, developing tax strategies or preparing and prosecuting filings with government agencies such as the Internal Revenue Service, the Securities and Exchange Commission or the Patent and Trademark Office.

[edit] Specialization
The neutrality of this section is disputed. Please see the discussion on the talk page. Please do not remove this message until the dispute is resolved. (December 2007)

Many American attorneys limit their practices to specialized fields of law. Often dichotomies are drawn between different types of attorneys, but these are neither fixed nor formal lines. Examples include:

Outside counsel (law firms) v. in-house counsel (corporate legal department)
Plaintiff v. Defense Attorneys (some attorneys do both plaintiff and defense work, others only handle certain types of cases like personal injury, business etc.)
Transactional (or "office practice") attorneys (who negotiate and draft documents and advise clients, rarely going to court) v. litigators (who advise clients in the context of legal disputes both in and out of court, including lawsuits, arbitrations and negotiated settlements)
Trial attorneys (who argue the facts, such as the late Johnnie Cochran) v. appellate attorneys (who argue the law, such as David Boies)
Despite these descriptions, most states forbid or discourage claims of specialization in particular areas of law unless the attorney has been certified by his or her state bar[1] or state board of legal specialization. Other states allow indirect indications of specialization (in the form of advertisement language such as "our practice is limited to . . ."), but require that the lawyer states that he or she is not certified by a state board of legal specialization in the advertised practice area. Patent attorneys are allowed to advertise their specialization in all jurisdictions, since registration for patent law is administered by the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) instead of a state-level body.

Some states grant formal certifications recognizing specialties. In California, for example, bar certification is offered in family law, appellate practice, criminal law, bankruptcy, estate planning, immigration, taxation and workers' compensation. Any attorney meeting the bar requirements in one of these fields may represent himself as a specialist. Similarly, Texas formally grants certification of specialization in the following fields: administrative law, business bankruptcy law, civil appellate law, civil trial law, consumer bankruptcy law, consumer law, commercial law, criminal law, estate planning and probate law, family law, health law, immigration and nationality law, juvenile law, labor and employment law, oil, gas and mineral law, personal injury, trial law, real estate law, tax law and workers' compensation law.[2]

The vast majority of lawyers practicing in a particular field may typically not be certified as specialists in that field (and state board certification is not generally required to practice law in any field). For example, the State Bar of Texas (as of mid-2006) reported 77,056 persons licensed as attorneys in that state (excluding inactive members of the Bar)[2], while the Texas Board of Legal Specialization reported, at about the same time, only 8,303 Texas attorneys who were board certified in any specialty.[3] Indeed, of the 8,303 certified specialists in Texas, the highest number of attorneys certified in one specific field at that time was 1,775 (in personal injury trial law). Despite the relative large number of lawyers that presumably would handle divorce, adoption and child custody matters, Texas reported that of 77,056 attorneys, only 697 in the entire state were certified in family law (which is, arguably, the applicable specialty).

Specialization in patent law is administered by the Office of Enrollment and Discipline of the USPTO, which imposes stringent requirements for applicants to become registered as patent attorneys or patent agents.

About half of American attorneys work solo or in small firms[citation needed]; see law firm. There are also many mid-size firms, with anywhere from 50 to 200 attorneys and since the 1970s, some law firms have merged to form giant firms with 1,000 attorneys or more.

However, whether a law firm is large or small is also a relative concept depending on the size of the community served. A law firm with six attorneys in a small community may be considered a large firm for that area. Because of conflict of interest rules, the maximum size of a law firm is dependent upon the size of the population it serves. Conflict of interest rules prevent one attorney in a law firm from, for example, representing a client in litigation that has an adverse interest to the interests of another client represented by a different attorney in the same law firm.

[edit] Control of cases
An American attorney licensed in each applicable court may in a few cases control and argue his or her case at each level of the judiciary through its entire life cycle. A notable example of this is the Brown v. Board of Education litigation, where the same trial team handled the case from start to finish at the U.S. Supreme Court. However, cases which advance to the appellate level, particularly to the U.S. Supreme Court, are often re-assigned to experienced appellate practitioners or firms.

[edit] Education and training
Main article: Legal education in the United States

[edit] Avenues to becoming a lawyer
Main article: Admission to the bar in the United States
Almost all U.S. jurisdictions require successful completion of a bar examination to be licensed as an attorney. All but a few of those states which require a bar exam also require the applicant to have taken a degree in professional law from an accredited law school; most require it to be an professional degree in law granted in the United States (usually the Juris Doctor, or J.D., a doctorate). Only a few states accept foreign law degrees. In addition to this formal education, attorneys in most jurisdictions must complete regular Continuing Legal Education (CLE) requirements.

Bar exams are administered by agencies of individual states. In 1763, Delaware created the first bar exam with other American colonies soon following suit.[3] A state bar licensing agency is invariably associated with the judicial branch of government because American attorneys are all officers of the court of the bar or bars to which they belong. Sometimes the agency is an office or committee of the state's highest court or intermediate appellate court.

In some states which have a unified or integrated bar association (meaning that formal membership in a public corporation controlled by the judiciary is required to practice law therein), the agency is either the state bar association or a subunit of it. Other states split the integrated bar membership and the admissions agency into different bodies within the judiciary. In Texas, for example, the Board of Law Examiners is appointed by the Texas Supreme Court and is independent from the integrated State Bar of Texas.

In almost all jurisdictions, the Multistate Professional Responsibility Examination (MPRE), an ethics exam, is also administered by the National Conference of Bar Examiners (NCBE), which creates it and grades it. The NCBE created the MPRE in 1980. The MPRE is offered three times a year, in March, August and November.

The bar examination in most U.S. states and territories is at least two days long (a few states have three-day exams).[4] It consists of essay questions, usually testing knowledge of the state's own law (usually subjects such as wills, trusts and community property, which always vary from one state to another). Some jurisdictions choose to use the Multistate Essay Examination (MEE), drafted by the NCBE since 1988, for this purpose. Others may draft their own questions with this goal in mind, while some states both draft their own questions and use the MEE. Some jurisdictions administer complicated questions that specifically test knowledge of that state's law.

Bar exams also usually consists of the Multistate Bar Examination, which is a multiple-choice standardized test created and sold to participating state bar examiners by the National Conference of Bar Examiners since 1972.[5] The MBE contains 200 questions which test six subjects based upon principles of common law and Article 2 of the Uniform Commercial Code.

A majority of U.S. jurisdictions also require a performance test, which is intended to be a more realistic measure of actual lawyering skill. The candidate is presented with a stack of documents representing a fictional case and is asked to draft a memorandum, motion or opinion document. Many jurisdictions use the Multistate Performance Test (MPT), which was first created in 1997, while California drafts and administers its own performance tests.

The State of Washington has a separate Law Clerk program under Rule Six of the Washington Court Admission to Practice Rules. A college graduate of good moral character may be accepted into the four-year Rule Six Law Clerk program, obtain employment in a law firm or with a judge for at least 30 hours a week and study a proscribed Course of Study under a tutor. After successful completion of the Rule Six Law Clerk program, a law clerk may take the Washington State Bar Exam and, upon passing, will be admitted as an attorney into the Washington State Bar Association.

[edit] Degrees in law
Main article: Law degree
The degree earned by prospective attorneys in the United States is generally a Juris Doctor (Latin for "Doctor of Jurisprudence"; abbreviated J.D. or, when conferred in English, D.Jur.).

This is distinct from most other Anglophone countries, where law is taught at the undergraduate level and the Bachelor of Laws (LL.B.) or other bachelor's degree is conferred. This undergraduate degree was followed by the Master of Laws (LL.M.), a master's degree in law. Where the LL.B. is still awarded, the highest degree is often still the Doctor of Laws (LL.D.), which is an academic degree in law (i.e. geared toward academia or theory rather than legal practice). The LL.D. is now exclusively given in the United States as an honorary degree.

In the United States, the LL.B. was elevated to the graduate school curriculum as a second bachelor's degree starting in 1896 with Harvard Law School under Christopher Columbus Langdell, "the father of modern American legal education." Then, starting in 1902 at the newly-established University of Chicago Law School, the J.D. replaced the LL.B as the professional doctorate in law. By 1971, all American Bar Association-accredited law schools had replaced the LL.B with the J.D.

Because Louisiana has a system that, uniquely among the states, uses civil law, the Paul M. Hebert Law Center at Louisiana State University in the now offers a joint J.D./Diploma of Civil Law (D.C.L.) over seven semesters (instead of its previous six-semester program for the J.D. alone) in recognition of the increased Louisiana civil law component of the new program.

The LL.M. continues to be offered in the United States for two distinct purposes. One is to offer lawyers the chance to acquire an advanced level of expertise in a specific legal discipline, such as tax law. The LL.M may be a type of specialist post-doctoral degree. The other purpose is keeping the LL.M. as a degree for non-U.S. educated attorneys with the LL.B. or other non-U.S. law degree. Many foreign lawyers who have such a degree come to study in the United States to obtain an LL.M. degree in comparative law, in order to familiarize themselves with U.S. common law and to enable themselves to take the bar exam in New York or California, both of which allow foreign attorneys with such degrees to take the exam. Some of these lawyers end up practicing law in the U.S., while many of them return to their home countries and use their U.S. LL.M. and bar admission as a gateway to advising international clients.

The highest law degree obtainable in the United States is Doctor of Juridical Science (Scientiae Juridicae Doctor, abbreviated S.J.D. or J.S.D.). This is an academic degree that, like the Ph.D., is research-based and requires a dissertation (an original contribution to the academic study of law). The degree is very rarely awarded and is generally only sought by attorneys holding exceptional credentials and a desire to enter the legal academy (i.e. to become professors of law). The degree is generally only offered at top-tier law schools, which typically accept only a handful of students into their program each year. Admission is usually limited to those who have achieved their J.D. and LL.M. degrees with distinction. Successful applicants often have already published significant scholarly legal articles in their proposed area of study and a lot of them have legal teaching experience prior to entering the program.

[edit] Law students in court
Some courts allow law students to act as "certified student attorneys" after the satisfactory completion of their first year of law school and the completion of particular second- and third-year courses with subjects such as evidence. Many states allow students to argue in front of a court as a certified legal intern (CLI), provided they meet certain prerequisites, such as having completed at least half of their law education, having taken or be taking the law school's ethics class and being under the supervision of a qualified and licensed attorney.

This concept was somewhat misrepresented in the movie Legally Blonde, where the protagonist Elle argues before a jury. Although Elle was under the supervision of an attorney, no state would allow a student still completing the first year of law to argue a case in court. However, it is reminiscent of "teen court" programs that are expanding around the USA. In these programs, it is not law students, but high school students, who argue cases before a judge and sit on juries to decide penalties to impose upon other high school students who have agreed to be tried by the teen court in exchange for bypassing the regular court and having no criminal record created in the process, even if they are found responsible for a crime by the teen court. The punishment often includes community service, including sitting on juries in upcoming cases.

Additionally, most states have rules allowing law students in their third and final year to practise on a limited basis while under the direct supervision of a licensed attorney. These laws vary from state to state. While many states are very strict, some states like Kansas provide opportunities for law students to argue cases before juries.

[edit] Illinois: The 711 license
In Illinois, a student currently in good standing who has earned credits that represent at least three-fifths of the credits required for graduation, may be eligible for a 711 license (based on Illinois Supreme Court Rule 711). A 711 license allows a student to: (1) Counsel clients, negotiate in the settlement of claims and engage in the preparation and drafting of legal instruments. (2) Appear in the trial courts and administrative tribunals subject to the following qualifications: (i) Appearances, pleadings, motions and other documents to be filed with the court may be prepared by the student or graduate and may be signed by him with the accompanying designation "Senior Law Student" or "Law Graduate" and must also be signed by the supervising member of the bar. (ii) In criminal cases, in which the penalty may be imprisonment, in proceedings challenging sentences of imprisonment and in civil or criminal contempt proceedings, the student or graduate may participate in pre-trial, trial and post-trial proceedings as an assistant of the supervising member of the bar, who shall be present and responsible for the conduct of the proceedings. (iii) In all other civil and criminal cases, the student or graduate may conduct all pre-trial, trial and post-trial proceedings and the supervising member of the bar need not be present. (3) The student may prepare briefs, excerpts from the record, abstracts and other documents filed in courts of review of the State, which may set forth the name of the student or graduate with the accompanying designation "Senior Law Student" or "Law Graduate" and must be filed in the name of the supervising member of the bar.

A graduate who has completed the Juris Doctor may qualify for a 711 license if the graduate (1) has not yet had an opportunity to take the first Bar examination scheduled after graduation, (2) has taken the Bar exam, but has not received the results or (3) has taken and passed the Bar examination, but has not yet been sworn in as a member of the Illinois bar.

A 711 license is not available for a student working for a private law firm. The license is available for work with (1) a legal aid bureau, legal assistance program, organization or clinic chartered by the State of Illinois or approved by a law school approved by the American Bar Association, (2) the Office of the Public Defender or (3) a law office of the State or any of its subdivisions

Mesothelioma Lawyers

2009-08-04T12:35:00.000-07:00

Mesothelioma Lawyers Mesothelioma Lawyers Mesothelioma Lawyers Mesothelioma Lawyers Mesothelioma Lawyers Mesothelioma Lawyers Mesothelioma Lawyers Mesothelioma Lawyers Mesothelioma Lawyers Mesothelioma Lawyers Mesothelioma Lawyers Mesothelioma Lawyers Mesothelioma Lawyers Mesothelioma Lawyers Mesothelioma Lawyers Mesothelioma Lawyers Mesothelioma Lawyers Mesothelioma Lawyers Mesothelioma Lawyers Mesothelioma Lawyers Mesothelioma Lawyers

Mesothelioma Lawyers - Important Information for Patients
By Michael Horwin, MA, JD*

Deciding to pursue legal recourse and selecting an attorney to represent you in a mesothelioma or asbestos lawsuit are important decisions that should be made carefully. I have seen some families receive $500,000 and others be awarded nearly $30 million. I have seen some lawyers reject a case only to have another firm accept it and make a big success of it. And I have seen some families wait nearly three years to receive their first check while others received large checks within three months of filing a claim. The main reasons for these differences are the facts of the patient's situation and the law firm chosen.

The Facts of Your Situation

Some mesothelioma patients know they worked around asbestos, but many do not know how they were exposed or how often. In fact, many people are not sure if they were ever near this carcinogen. Unfortunately, there have been thousands of products that contained asbestos - cigarette filters, hair dryers, brakes, basement and roof materials, pipes, boilers, insulation, and many other products found throughout the home and at work. If you were diagnosed with mesothelioma it is more than likely that you were exposed to asbestos multiple times in your life and that this happened decades before your diagnosis.

In general, the value of your case depends on how many asbestos containing products you were exposed to, the number of identifiable defendants that still exist (many have declared bankruptcy), your age and earning capacity. And the speed of your case can depend on a number of variables including the state where you worked and lived when you were exposed to asbestos.

The Law Firm You Choose

When you have been given the news about this terrible disease, you may not feel that you have the time to deal with the legal questions - Should I talk to a lawyer? Should I file a claim? However, you should not wait too long to learn about your legal rights for at least three reasons:

Statutes of Limitations - There are statute of limitations which means you only have a limited time to file your case after diagnosis. The statute of limitations time period is set by individual states and varies. The clock usually starts ticking on the day of diagnosis.

Financial Pressure - A mesothelioma diagnosis can bring financial stress, less income, more expenses, and treatments that are not covered by insurance. Knowing that money may be on the way from filing a claim can bring financial relief.

Lawyers Can be Excellent Resources - The more experienced mesothelioma lawyers and law firms can often be excellent sources of information about various doctors and treatment options available for this disease.

But, picking a lawyer is serious business and you should not use TV ads as the reason to hire an attorney. Actual credentials are what counts. For example, what type of accomplishments has the law firm achieved? How committed are they to mesothelioma/asbestos cases? Are these cases a substantial part of their practice or just a small piece? How many other cases like yours have they handled?

Also, make sure you understand the fees being charges. Contingency is the term that means that the lawyer gets paid only after they collect money for you. The amount of the contingency fee that your lawyer can charge varies and is usually between 33% and 40%. It is important to discuss fees openly, ask what services they cover, how they are calculated, and whether there will be any extra charges.

Finally, for something as important as a mesothelioma lawsuit, your attorney should not only be experienced, skilled, and dedicated, but also a trusted partner who understands that your health needs always take precedence. The best lawyers are those that are not only expert at what they do, but are also caring, supportive, thoughtful and compassionate.

Below are two mesothelioma law firms that have impressed us with their accomplishments, successes and testimonials. If you are in another state, call us at 1-619-599-3112 and we can share with you the names of reputable mesothelioma law firms in your region.

loans

2009-08-04T12:33:00.000-07:00

loans loans loans loans loans loans loans loans loans loans loans loans loans loans loans loans loans loans loans loans loans loans loans loans loans loans loans loans loans loans loans loans loans loans loans loans loans loans loans loans loans

Emergency Loans
We need a loan every time we face a situation where we can not meet the ends meet and we need some kind of financial injection that’ll cure the problem. Specially in emergencies, getting a loan can really help and once the emergency is over, repaying that loan never feels like a burden. Emergencies can vary, one might have to travel to attend an important an event like a wedding or a tragic family funeral or might require some quick cash in order to pay for expensive medicines if he/she falls sick etc.

Ever now and then we face a situation where things are not under our control and if you are low on savings or have low income, a loan provided in emergency does feel like a blessing. In such cases, people mostly prefer short term loans that they mean to pay back on the next pay day or a couple of months max. The best places to get a loan are the financial institutions but you can also apply for payday advance loans that are available online. Google the terms and you’ll see how many choices can be found online.

Apply now for an Emergency Loan

Home Loans
Banks, as I am sure that you are already aware of, can also provide loans. People usually apply in banks for large sum of loans for instance home loans. First time home buyers mostly plan to spend around a hundred and fifty thousand (USD $150,000) to three hundred thousand dollars ($300,000). For the first time home buyers, it’s absolutely important that they find a bank which is offering home loans on lower interest rates and with a good 25-30 years of repayment schedule.

If you are already shopping for home loans, let Credit and Mortgage Index help you find low mortgage rates. Click here to request a loan and get answers in minutes.

Car loans / Auto Loans
At present, one of the most widely used and important loan for a common man is a car loan. These types of loans are designed for people who want to purchase a car and are normally known as car loans or auto loans. You can apply for a car loan regardless what kind of car you are looking for. It can be a small more economical compact car or it can also be a SUV. The amount of loan that you want to borrow and the interest rates will heavily depend on your credit, your monthly income and your age. If you have a poor employment history then that will also have a negative effect on the total amount and the interest rate associated with the loan.

Click here to check our 60 seconds auto financing, no obligation and no restrictions. Bad credit? No problem, apply now!

Student Loans
You can apply for a student loan if you are going to a college or a trade school. You can also apply for student loan if you want to get a new diploma in a specialized field. You can get in touch with government or private sector lenders to borrow these loans. What you have to make sure is that you strike a deal where you don’t have to pay high interest rates. If you are going to a trade school then there is a good chance that you won’t have to borrow as much money as you would if you are going to join a college and graduate in 4 years. With trade schools, your loan repayment schedule will begin after you have graduated.

Personal Loans
People need loans for personal needs, needs that do not really have anything to do with the basic necessities of life like medical, car loans or loans for home purchasing.

For instance personal needs like traveling during holidays, cosmetic surgeries, going out for a lovely honeymoon or getting a loan to have a wedding of your dream. This type of loan is known as Personal loan. Usually personal loans carry a higher interest rate because these loans are tailor made for personal needs of the borrower that vary from case to case. Before you apply for personal loans with a financial institute, you should do a little research on the internet. There is a good chance that you will find a lender that is offering these loans on lower interest rates.

If you are looking to borrow, you can get instant answers from multiple lenders. Click here to apply NOW

Apply for unsecured loans ranging from $300 to $10,000. Fast cash and longer term loans depending on your needs. Click here.

Credit Cards
Many people do not realize that by using credit cards, they are already using loans. In fact, many Americans believe that they just have to have a credit card because for them it’s a thing that everybody has which can also lead you to believe that their interest rates are the lowest possible interest rates and life can become very easy thanks to credit cards. The fact is that credit cards are the biggest loan industry in the world, left alone America. It makes your life easier by giving facilities like not paying using cash or having to buy something off the shelf when you don’t have enough to pay for it at once but the interest rates are pretty high compared to any other loan. There are good chances that you will miss paying a monthly bill because lets face it, sometimes work and domestic issues can lead to missing out the deadline of the bill that you need to clear before you cross the due date and that will leave a big bad stain on your credit report.

lawyer

2009-08-04T12:31:00.000-07:00

lawyer lawyer lawyer lawyer lawyer lawyer lawyer lawyer lawyer lawyer lawyer lawyer lawyer lawyer lawyer lawyer lawyer lawyer lawyer lawyer lawyer lawyer lawyer lawyer lawyer lawyer lawyer lawyer lawyer lawyer lawyer lawyer lawyer lawyer lawyer lawyer lawyer lawyer lawyer lawyer lawyer lawyer lawyer lawyer lawyer lawyer lawyer lawyer lawyer lawyer lawyer lawyer lawyer lawyer lawyer

A lawyer, according to Black's Law Dictionary, is "a person learned in the law; as an attorney, counsel or solicitor; a person licensed to practice law."[1] Law is the system of rules of conduct established by the sovereign government of a society to correct wrongs, maintain stability, and deliver justice. Working as a lawyer involves the practical application of abstract legal theories and knowledge to solve specific individualized problems, or to advance the interests of those who retain (i.e., hire) lawyers to perform legal services.

The role of the lawyer varies significantly across legal jurisdictions, and so it can be treated here in only the most general terms.[2][3] More information is available in country-specific articles (see below).

Contents [hide]
1 Terminology
2 Responsibilities
2.1 Oral argument in the courts
2.2 Research and drafting of court papers
2.3 Advocacy (written and oral) in administrative hearings
2.4 Client intake and counseling (with regard to pending litigation)
2.5 Legal advice
2.6 Protecting intellectual property
2.7 Negotiating and drafting contracts
2.8 Conveyancing
2.9 Carrying out the intent of the deceased
2.10 Prosecution and defense of criminal suspects
3 Education
3.1 Earning the right to practice law
4 Career structure
4.1 Common law/civil law
4.2 Specialization
4.3 Organization
5 Professional associations and regulation
5.1 Mandatory licensing and membership in professional organizations
5.2 Who regulates lawyers
5.3 Voluntary associations of lawyers
6 Cultural perception of lawyers
7 Compensation
8 History
8.1 Ancient Greece
8.2 Early Ancient Rome
8.3 Late Ancient Rome
8.4 Middle Ages
9 Titles
10 See also
11 Notes
12 External links

[edit] Terminology
In practice, legal jurisdictions exercise their right to determine who is recognized as being a lawyer; as a result, the meaning of the term "lawyer" may vary from place to place.[4]

In New Zealand and Australia the word "lawyer" is used to refer to both barristers and solicitors (whether in private practice or practising as corporate in-house counsel).
In Canada, the word "lawyer" only refers to individuals who have been called to the bar or have qualified as civil law notaries in the province of Quebec. Common law lawyers in Canada may also be known as "barristers and solicitors", but should not be referred to as "attorneys", since that term has a different meaning in Canadian usage. However, in Quebec, civil law advocates (or avocats in French) often call themselves "attorney" and sometimes "barrister and solicitor".
In England, "lawyer" is used loosely to refer to a broad variety of law-trained persons. It includes practitioners such as barristers, solicitors, legal executives and licensed conveyancers; and people who are involved with the law but do not practise it on behalf of individual clients, such as judges, court clerks, and drafters of legislation.
In India, the term "lawyer" is often colloquially used, but the official term is "advocate" as prescribed under the Advocates Act, 1961.[5]
In Scotland, the word "lawyer" refers to a more specific group of legally trained people. It specifically includes advocates and solicitors. In a generic sense, it may also include judges and law-trained support staff.
In the United States, the term generally refers to attorneys who may practice law; it is never used to refer to patent agents[6] or paralegals.[7]
Other nations tend to have comparable terms for the analogous concept.

[edit] Responsibilities
In most countries, particularly civil law countries, there has been a tradition of giving many legal tasks to a variety of civil law notaries, clerks, and scriveners.[8][9] These countries do not have "lawyers" in the American sense, insofar as that term refers to a single type of general-purpose legal services provider;[10] rather, their legal professions consist of a large number of different kinds of law-trained persons, known as jurists, of which only some are advocates who are licensed to practice in the courts.[11][12][13] It is difficult to formulate accurate generalizations that cover all the countries with multiple legal professions, because each country has traditionally had its own peculiar method of dividing up legal work among all its different types of legal professionals.[14]

Notably, England, the mother of the common law jurisdictions, emerged from the Dark Ages with similar complexity in its legal professions, but then evolved by the 19th century to a single dichotomy between barristers and solicitors. An equivalent dichotomy developed between advocates and procurators in some civil law countries, though these two types did not always monopolize the practice of law as much as barristers and solicitors, in that they always coexisted with civil law notaries.[15][16][17]

Several countries that originally had two or more legal professions have since fused or united their professions into a single type of lawyer.[18][19][20][21] Most countries in this category are common law countries, though France, a civil law country, merged together its jurists in 1990 and 1991 in response to Anglo-American competition.[22] In countries with fused professions, a lawyer is usually permitted to carry out all or nearly all the responsibilities listed below.

[edit] Oral argument in the courts
Arguing a client's case before a judge or jury in a court of law is the traditional province of the barrister in England, and of advocates in some civil law jurisdictions.[23] However, the boundary between barristers and solicitors has evolved. In England today, the barrister monopoly covers only appellate courts, and barristers must compete directly with solicitors in many trial courts.[24] In countries like the United States that have fused legal professions, there are trial lawyers who specialize in trying cases in court, but trial lawyers do not have a de jure monopoly like barristers.

In some countries, litigants have the option of arguing pro se, or on their own behalf. It is common for litigants to appear unrepresented before certain courts like small claims courts; indeed, many such courts do not allow lawyers to speak for their clients, in an effort to save money for all participants in a small case.[25] In other countries, like Venezuela, no one may appear before a judge unless represented by a lawyer.[26] The advantage of the latter regime is that lawyers are familiar with the court's customs and procedures, and make the legal system more efficient for all involved. Unrepresented parties often damage their own credibility or slow the court down as a result of their inexperience.[27][28]

[edit] Research and drafting of court papers
Often, lawyers brief a court in writing on the issues in a case before the issues can be orally argued. They may have to perform extensive research into relevant facts and law while drafting legal papers and preparing for oral argument.

In England, the usual division of labour is that a solicitor will obtain the facts of the case from the client and then brief a barrister (usually in writing).[29] The barrister then researches and drafts the necessary court pleadings (which will be filed and served by the solicitor) and orally argues the case.[30]

In Spain, the procurator merely signs and presents the papers to the court, but it is the advocate who drafts the papers and argues the case.[31]

In some countries, like Japan, a scrivener or clerk may fill out court forms and draft simple papers for lay persons who cannot afford or do not need attorneys, and advise them on how to manage and argue their own cases.[32]

[edit] Advocacy (written and oral) in administrative hearings
In most developed countries, the legislature has granted original jurisdiction over highly technical matters to executive branch administrative agencies which oversee such things. As a result, some lawyers have become specialists in administrative law. In a few countries, there is a special category of jurists with a monopoly over this form of advocacy; for example, France formerly had conseil juridiques (who were merged into the main legal profession in 1991).[33] In other countries, like the United States, lawyers have been effectively barred by statute from certain types of administrative hearings in order to preserve their informality.[34]

[edit] Client intake and counseling (with regard to pending litigation)
An important aspect of a lawyer's job is developing and managing relationships with clients (or the client's employees, if the lawyer works in-house for a government or corporation). The client-lawyer relationship often begins with an intake interview where the lawyer gets to know the client personally, discovers the facts of the client's case, clarifies what the client wants to accomplish, shapes the client's expectations as to what actually can be accomplished, begins to develop various claims or defenses, and explains his or her fees to the client.[35][36]

In England, only solicitors were traditionally in direct contact with the client.[37] The solicitor retained a barrister if one was necessary and acted as an intermediary between the barrister and the client.[38] In most cases a barrister would be obliged, under what is known as the "cab rank rule", to accept instructions for a case in an area in which they held themselves out as practising, at a court at which they normally appeared and at their usual rates.[39][40]

[edit] Legal advice
Main article: Legal advice
Legal advice is the application of abstract principles of law to the concrete facts of the client's case in order to advise the client about what they should do next. In many countries, only a properly licensed lawyer may provide legal advice to clients for good consideration, even if no lawsuit is contemplated or is in progress.[41][42][43] Therefore, even conveyancers and corporate in-house counsel must first get a license to practice, though they may actually spend very little of their careers in court. Failure to obey such a rule is the crime of unauthorized practice of law.[44]

In other countries, jurists who hold law degrees are allowed to provide legal advice to individuals or to corporations, and it is irrelevant if they lack a license and cannot appear in court.[45][46] Some countries go further; in England and Wales, there is no general prohibition on the giving of legal advice.[47] Sometimes civil law notaries are allowed to give legal advice, as in Belgium.[48] In many countries, non-jurist accountants may provide what is technically legal advice in tax and accounting matters.[49]

[edit] Protecting intellectual property
In virtually all countries, patents, trademarks, industrial designs and other forms of intellectual property must be formally registered with a government agency in order to receive maximum protection under the law. The division of such work among lawyers, licensed non-lawyer jurists/agents, and ordinary clerks or scriveners varies greatly from one country to the next.[32][50]

[edit] Negotiating and drafting contracts
In some countries, the negotiating and drafting of contracts is considered to be similar to the provision of legal advice, so that it is subject to the licensing requirement explained above.[51] In others, jurists or notaries may negotiate or draft contracts.[52]

Lawyers in some civil law countries traditionally deprecated "transactional law" or "business law" as beneath them. French law firms developed transactional departments only in the 1990s when they started to lose business to international firms based in the United States and the United Kingdom (where solicitors have always done transactional work).[53]

[edit] Conveyancing
Conveyancing is the drafting of the documents necessary for the transfer of real property, such as deeds and mortgages. In some jurisdictions, all real estate transactions must be carried out by a lawyer (or a solicitor where that distinction still exists).[54] Such a monopoly is quite valuable from the lawyer's point of view; historically, conveyancing accounted for about half of English solicitors' income (though this has since changed),[55] and a 1978 study showed that conveyancing "accounts for as much as 80 percent of solicitor-client contact in New South Wales."[56] In most common law jurisdictions outside of the United States, this monopoly arose from an 1804 law[57] that was introduced by William Pitt the Younger as a quid pro quo for the raising of fees on the certification of legal professionals such as barristers, solicitors, attorneys and notaries.[58]

In others, the use of a lawyer is optional and banks, title companies, or realtors may be used instead.[59] In some civil law jurisdictions, real estate transactions are handled by civil law notaries.[60] In England and Wales a special class of legal professional–the licensed conveyancer–is also allowed to carry out conveyancing services for reward.[61]

[edit] Carrying out the intent of the deceased
In many countries, only lawyers have the legal authority to draft wills, trusts, and any other documents that ensure the efficient disposition of a person's property after death. In some civil law countries this responsibility is handled by civil law notaries.[52]

In the United States, the estates of the deceased must generally be administered by a court through probate. American lawyers have a profitable monopoly on dispensing advice about probate law (which has been heavily criticized).[62]

[edit] Prosecution and defense of criminal suspects
In many civil law countries, prosecutors are trained and employed as part of the judiciary; they are law-trained jurists, but may not necessarily be lawyers in the sense that the word is used in the common law world.[63] In common law countries, prosecutors are usually lawyers holding regular licenses who simply happen to work for the government office that files criminal charges against suspects. Criminal defense lawyers specialize in the defense of those charged with any crimes.[64]

[edit] Education
Main article: Legal education
The educational prerequisites to becoming a lawyer vary greatly from country to country. In some countries, law is taught by a faculty of law, which is a department of a university's general undergraduate college.[65] Law students in those countries pursue a Master or Bachelor of Laws degree. In some countries it is common or even required for students to earn another bachelor's degree at the same time. Nor is the LL.B the sole obstacle; it is often followed by a series of advanced examinations, apprenticeships, and additional coursework at special government institutes.[66]

In other countries, particularly the United States, law is primarily taught at law schools. In the United States[67] and countries following the American model, (such as Canada[68] with the exception of the province of Quebec) law schools are graduate/professional schools where a bachelor's degree is a prerequisite for admission. Most law schools are part of universities but a few are independent institutions. Law schools in the United States (and many in Canada and elsewhere) award graduating students a J.D. (Juris Doctor/Doctor of Jurisprudence) (as opposed to the Bachelor of Laws) as the practitioner's law degree. Many schools also offer post-doctoral law degrees such as the LL.M (Legum Magister/Master of Laws), or the S.J.D. (Scientiae Juridicae Doctor/Doctor of the Science of Law) for students interested in advancing their research knowledge and credentials in a specific area of law.[69]

The methods and quality of legal education vary widely. Some countries require extensive clinical training in the form of apprenticeships or special clinical courses.[70] Others do not, like Venezuela.[71] A few countries prefer to teach through assigned readings of judicial opinions (the casebook method) followed by intense in-class cross-examination by the professor (the Socratic method).[72][73] Many others have only lectures on highly abstract legal doctrines, which forces young lawyers to figure out how to actually think and write like a lawyer at their first apprenticeship (or job).[74][75][76] Depending upon the country, a typical class size could range from five students in a seminar to five hundred in a giant lecture room. In the United States, law schools maintain small class sizes, and as such, grant admissions on a more limited and competitive basis.[77]

Some countries, particularly industrialized ones, have a traditional preference for full-time law programs,[78] while in developing countries, students often work full- or part-time to pay the tuition and fees of their part-time law programs.[79][80]

Law schools in developing countries share several common problems, such as an overreliance on practicing judges and lawyers who treat teaching as a part-time hobby (and a concomitant scarcity of full-time law professors);[81][82] incompetent faculty with questionable credentials;[83] and textbooks that lag behind the current state of the law by two or three decades.[81][84]

mesothelioma

2009-08-04T12:18:00.000-07:00

mesothelioma mesothelioma mesothelioma mesothelioma mesothelioma mesothelioma mesothelioma mesothelioma mesothelioma mesothelioma mesothelioma mesothelioma mesothelioma mesothelioma mesothelioma mesothelioma mesothelioma mesothelioma mesothelioma mesothelioma mesothelioma mesothelioma mesothelioma mesothelioma mesothelioma mesothelioma mesothelioma mesothelioma

Mesothelioma
What is it?
Malignant mesothelioma is a rare type of cancer that occurs in the thin layer of cells lining the body's internal organs, known as the mesothelium. There are three recognized types of mesothelioma. Pleural mesothelioma is the most common form of the disease, accounting for roughly 70% of cases, and occurs in the lining of the lung known as the pleura. Peritoneal mesothelioma occurs in the lining of the abdominal cavity, known as the peritoneum and pericardial mesothelioma originates in the pericardium, which lines the heart.
Who is at risk for Mesothelioma?
The only recognized cause of mesothelioma is exposure to asbestos, though other factors such as smoking can make the disease more or less likely in some individuals. Industrial laborers were widely subjected to asbestos exposure on the job, as the material was widely used throughout the 20th century. Few of these workers knew they were being exposed to asbestos, however, despite the fact that many manufacturers were aware the material was hazardous. In most cases, mesothelioma symptoms will not appear in an individual exposed to asbestos until many years after the exposure has occurred. Those who believe they may have been exposed to asbestos should fill out our form to receive a free mesothelioma information packet, detailing treatment options, emerging therapies, and jobsite exposure information.
Mesothelioma Treatment
Once an individual has been diagnosed with mesothelioma, the next step is to discuss mesothelioma treatment options with his/her physician. Recent scientific research has produced significant breakthroughs with regard to treatment protocols for mesothelioma patients and more options are now available for managing the disease and supporting improved quality of life. Newly diagnosed patients always have many questions about the treatment options that would be most effective for them, including those about new treatment therapies like Alimta® and Cisplatin and other chemotherapy drugs. In addition to these newer drugs that are being used to treat asbestos cancer, mesothelioma patients also have a number of "conventional" treatment options to consider, including chemotherapy, radiation therapy and surgery.
Clinical trials and experimental treatments are still other options that some mesothelioma patients may be eligible to participate in. Our site features a comprehensive mesothelioma cancer treatment section that includes important information for patients and families. We've included resources on top mesothelioma doctors such as Dr. Sugarbaker, as well as a comprehensive list of questions that you may wish to discuss with your personal physician when preparing a treatment plan. We are always providing new and informative resources regarding mesothelioma treatment including: Clinical Trials, conventional treatments, experimental therapies, and more. Check back often for the most recent advances in mesothelioma treatments.
Carrie Redlich, M.D., Yale University School of Medicine
Dr. Carrie Redlich is a professor at the Yale University School of Medicine and Acting Director of the Occupational and Environmental Medicine Program with clinical interests in malignant mesothelioma and occupational lung disease.
Asbestos Exposure
Asbestos exposure is the single known cause of mesothelioma. Inhaled or ingested asbestos fibers may cause an inflammation of internal tissue and disrupt organ function which leads to the development of the disease. Asbestos products were used extensively throughout the 20th century in a wide variety of applications. Many of these products were responsible for asbestos exposure sustained by both the individuals who manufactured the products as well as those who used them at commercial and industrial jobsites including shipyards, refineries, power plants, steel plants and more. Several asbestos companies continued to produce these products even after they were known to be hazardous and harmful to workers and their families. Those who have become sick because of exposure to these products may now be eligible for financial compensation if they were wrongfully exposed.
Asbestos was also used at many New York jobsites including Ground Zero and the former World Trade Center site. Common asbestos exposure sites in New York include the Brooklyn Navy Yard, Todd Shipyard, and the Con Edison power plant in New York City.
Acupuncturist on a mission to "nourish the soul" of fellow veterans
Douglas Karr - August 4, 2009
As a veteran myself, I can tell you that there is an unexplainable and unbreakable bond between veterans. This bond is present no matter what branch of the military you served in: Navy vets feel a connection to former Marines; those who served in the Army have a bond with Air Force Vets, and so on. Read More
Veteran Support
Navy veterans who worked in navy shipyards and or served on our nation’s warships and submarine’s from WWII through the Vietnam War were exposed to high concentrations of deadly asbestos. Boiler rooms, engine rooms, sleeping quarters, and other areas of naval vessels were the most common areas where asbestos was present. As a result, Navy veterans are at a greater risk of developing mesothelioma. Veterans who were exposed should fill out the brief form on this page to receive a free mesothelioma and asbestos exposure information kit. Support systems are in place to make sure you receive the assistance you deserve.

asbetos lawsuit

2009-08-04T12:12:00.001-07:00

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Asbestos lawsuits are filed by plaintiffs who have suffered as the result of asbestos-related illness. Plaintiffs in asbestos lawsuits can include the victims of asbestos exposure, or their families or loved ones. Defendants against asbestos lawsuits are those parties considered responsible for the asbestos exposure. In the past, targets of asbestos lawsuits have included:
Employers
Asbestos manufacturers
Asbestos installers
Landlords
Leasing agents
Financial Recovery
The purpose of asbestos lawsuits is to recover financial damages that result from asbestos related illness. Possible financial recoveries from asbestos lawsuits include:
cost of medical bills
lost wages
other associated costs
In some asbestos lawsuits, punitive damages (designed to punish the defendant) are also awarded. A few states permit asbestos lawsuits to be filed by people who reasonably expect to develop asbestos-related illnesses. These asbestos lawsuits regulations allow individuals exposed to asbestos to attempt to prepare financially for likely diseases. Many asbestos lawsuits have served to help publicize the adverse health effects of asbestos exposure; increasing numbers of asbestos lawsuits are decided for the plaintiffs as information about asbestos exposure becomes common knowledge. Read about Asbestos Bankrupty funds, asbestos bankruptcy trusts, asbestos bankruptcy companies and asbestos bankruptcy information in general.
Although asbestos lawsuits can be complicated at first glance, a number of individuals have benefited from asbestos lawsuits, including families of victims, left with enormous medical and funeral costs. For more about asbestos lawsuits and whether your situation is appropriate for this proceeding, an attorney familiar with asbestos lawsuits may be the appropriate person to consult.
How Can a Mesothelioma Attorney Help?
Mesothelioma attorneys can help victims in recovering funds related to asbestos-caused mesothelioma. Many of the mesothelioma attorneys with experience in this field have successfully claimed costs from those responsible for asbestos exposure. Mesothelioma attorneys can regain medical costs, lost wages, and punitive fees for victims and their families.
A mesothelioma attorney can meet with victims to discuss liability in mesothelioma cases; using their prior experience, mesothelioma attorneys can often predict the likelihood of success of a particular case. A good mesothelioma attorney will have the legal knowledge and connections to pressure reluctant parties into accepting accountability; many mesothelioma attorneys end up enabling their client to collect without ever having to go to trial. Mesothelioma attorneys can also help put their clients in touch with the clients of other mesothelioma attorneys if both parties agree, so that the parties represented by both mesothelioma attorneys may exchange information and supportespecially important with such a rare disease.
Contact an Experienced Attorney
If you or a loved one has suffered from mesothelioma, please Contact a Mesothelioma Attorney to learn more information on mesothelioma and your legal rights!

life insurance policy

2009-08-04T12:05:00.000-07:00

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1. All policies fall into one of two camps.
There are term policies, or pure insurance coverage. And there are the many variants of whole life, which combine an investment product with pure term insurance and build cash value.
2. Insurance is sold, not bought.
Agents sell the vast majority of life policies written in the U.S. because the life insurance industry has a vested interest in pushing high-commission (and high-profit) whole-life policies.
3. Whole life is expensive.
Policies with an investment component cost many times more than term policies. As a result, many people who buy whole life often can't afford an adequate face value, leaving themselves underinsured.
4. Whole-life policies are built on assumptions.
The returns quoted by the agent are simply guesses - not reality. And some companies keep these guesses of future returns on the high side to attract more buyers.
5. Keep your investing and insurance strictly separate.
There are better places to invest - and without the high commissions of whole-life policies.
6. Buy enough term coverage to fill your needs.
Life insurance is no place to skimp, especially with rates at historic lows.
7. Match the term of the policy to your needs.
You want the policy to last as long as it takes for your dependents to leave the nest - or for your retirement income to kick in.
8. Buy when you're healthy.
Older people and those not in the best of health pay steeply higher rates for life insurance - so buy as early as you can, but don't buy until you have dependents.
9. Tell the truth.
There's no sense in shading the facts on your application to get a lower rate. Be assured that if a large claim is made, the insurance company will investigate before paying.
10. Use the Web to shop.
Buying life insurance has never been easier, thanks to the Internet. You can get tons of quotes - and avoid the pushy salespeople.

catagories

2009-07-30T02:57:00.001-07:00

Secured Loan Calculator

life insurance policy

Secured Loan Calculator

2009-07-30T02:56:00.001-07:00

Secured Loan CalculatorSecured Loan CalculatorSecured Loan CalculatorSecured Loan CalculatorSecured Loan CalculatorSecured Loan CalculatorSecured Loan CalculatorSecured Loan CalculatorSecured Loan CalculatorSecured Loan CalculatorSecured Loan CalculatorSecured Loan CalculatorSecured Loan CalculatorSecured Loan CalculatorSecured Loan CalculatorSecured Loan CalculatorSecured Loan CalculatorSecured Loan CalculatorSecured Loan CalculatorSecured Loan CalculatorSecured Loan CalculatorSecured Loan Calculator

Feel free to use our interactive secured loan calculator. Before deciding to apply for a loan some homeowners find it useful to understand the approximate cost of borrowing in terms of the monthly cost and the interest which is being charged. This is especially useful for homeowners who work to a monthly budget by knowing what their outgoings are such as household bills and mortgage payments versus income received.

To use the loan calculator simply enter the amount you wish to borrow and select a repayment period using the drop down menu. Then enter the interest rate and press the calculate button. The results are calculated using the generic compound interest formulae and show the monthly repayment and the monthly interest charged by the lender. For comparison purposes, which some find useful, an alternative monthly repayment figure is displayed below assuming an interest rate of 5.5% is charged.

Remember, this online calculator tool should be used as a guide only and some lenders will often build in Payment Protection Insurance or (PPI) in addition to possible secured loan application fees. Therefore, the actual monthly repayment amount in reality could be higher.

Monthly loan payments calculator

Loan required:	£	numbers only ( eg 12500 )
Repayment period:
Interest rate :		% ( enter 7.5% as 7.5 )


Monthly repayment	£	Repayment* loan
Monthly interest	£	Interest only loan

A comparison, for convenience, at 5.5%
Monthly repayment:	£	Repayment^*loan
Monthly interest:	£	Interest only

Mesothelioma Lawyers San Diego

2009-07-30T02:54:00.000-07:00

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The mesothelioma lawyers at Clapper, Patti, Schweizer & Mason have been representing families coping with mesothelioma and other asbestos diseases for over 25 years, and have recovered hundreds of millions of dollars for our asbestos and mesothelioma clients. In addition to attorneys, the Clapper, Patti, Schweizer & Mason team includes paralegals, administrative staff, and asbestos investigators who work together to provide you responsive, comprehensive representation.

Purchase Structured Settlements

2009-07-30T02:51:00.000-07:00

Purchase Structured Settlements
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What Is a Structured Settlement?

Sometimes when a plaintiff settles a case for a large sum of money, the defendant, the plaintiff's attorney, or a financial planner consulted in association with the settlement, will propose paying the settlement in installments over time rather than in a single lump sum. When a settlement is paid in this manner it is called a "structured settlement". Often the structured settlement will be created through the purchase of one or more annuities, which guarantee the future payments.

A structured settlement can provide for payment in pretty much any schedule the parties choose. For example, the settlement may be paid in annual installments over a number of years, or it may be paid in periodic lump sums every few years.

Benefits of a Structured Settlement

One significant advantage of a structured settlement is tax avoidance. With appropriate set-up, a structured settlement may significantly reduce the plaintiff's tax obligations as a result of the settlement, and may in some cases be tax-free.

A structured settlement can protect a plaintiff from having settlement funds dissipated, when they are necessary to pay for future care or needs. Sometimes a structured settlement can help protect a plaintiff from himself - some people simply aren't good with money, or can't say no to relatives who want to "share the wealth", and even a large settlement can be rapidly exhausted. Minors may benefit from a structured settlement as well, such as a settlement which provides for certain costs during their youth, an additional disbursement to pay for college or other educational expenses, and then one or more disbursements in adulthood. An injured person who has long-term special needs may benefit from having periodic lump sums with which to purchase medical equipment or modified vehicles.

In some situations, it will be better for a severely disabled plaintiff to set up a special needs trust, rather than entering into a lump sum or structured settlement. Any plaintiff who is receiving, or expects to receive, Medicaid or other public assistance, or the guardian or conservator entering into a settlement on behalf of a disabled ward, should consult with a disabilities financial planner about their situation before choosing any particular settlement option or structure.

Potential Disadvantages of Structured Settlements

Some people who enter into structured settlements feel trapped by the periodic payments. They may wish to purchase a new home, or other expensive item, yet be unable to muster the resources because they can't borrow against future payments under their settlement.

Some people will do better by accepting a lump sum settlement, and investing it themselves. Many standard investments will give a greater long-term return than the annuities used in structured settlements.

Selling a Structured Settlement

If you have a structured settlement, you may have been approached by a company interested in purchasing your settlement, or may be curious about selling your settlement in return for a lump sum buyout. About two thirds of states have enacted laws which restict the sale of structured settlements, and tax-free structured settlements are also subject to federal restrictions on their sale to a third party. Also, some insurance companies will not assign or transfer annuities to third parties, to discourage the sale of structured settlements. As a consequence, depending upon where you live and the terms of your annuities, it may not be possible for you to sell your settlement.

Keep in mind that companies which buy structured settlements intend to profit from their purchase, and sometimes their offers may seem quite low. You may benefit from approaching more than one company in relation to the sale of your settlement, to make sure that you obtain the highest payoff. You also want to be sure that the company which wants to buy your settlement is established, well-funded, and reputable - you don't want a fly-by-night outfit to obtain the rights to your annuities but to disappear or go bankrupt before paying you the buyout money. You may have to go to court to get a judge to approve the buyout. It is usually a good idea to consult with a lawyer before entering into an agreement to sell your settlement.

Special Considerations

Any person entering into a structured settlement should be on guard for potential exploitation in relation to the settlement:

Excessive Commissions - Annuities can be highly profitable for insurance companies, and they often carry very large commissions. It is important to ensure that the commissions charged in setting up a structured settlement don't consume an inappropriate percentage of its principal.

Overstated Value - Sometimes, after negotiating a particular settlement figure, the defense will overstate the value of a structured settlement. As a result the plaintiff, in accepting the settlement, in fact obtains a significantly lower dollar value than was agreed upon. Some defendants have nominally paid the full amount of the settlement, knowing that they would later obtain significant rebates from the annuity companies they used. Plaintiffs should consider compariing the fees and commissions charged for similar settlement packages by a variety of insurance companies, to make sure that they are in fact getting full value. A plaintiff may wish to make it a condition of the settlement that the defendant will actually pay the full value of the settlement in setting up the structured settlement, and that any rebates received by the defendant for annuities included in the settlement be payable to the plaintiff.

Self-Dealing - There have been cases where the plaintiff's lawyer is also in the insurance business, and sets up a structured settlement on behalf of a client without disclosing that the attorney is purchasing the annuities from his own business, or is pocketing a large commission on the annuities. Similarly, there have been situations where the plaintiff's attorney has referred the client to a particular financial planner to set up a structured settlement, without disclosing that the financial planner will be paying the attorney a referral fee in relation to the client's account. Make sure that you know what financial interest, if any, your lawyer has in relation to any financial services sold or recommended by the lawyer.

Life Expectancy - It is unfortunate, but many people who receive large personal injury or workers' compensation settlements will have a shortened life expectancy as a result of their injuries. It is important to consider life expectancy in association with any structured settlement, and to consider whether it is appropriate to enter into an annuity where payments will cease upon death. Sometimes it will make sense to insist upon an annuity that pays a minimum number of payments, or one that will pay a balance into the plaintiff's estate, such that the value of the settlement is not lost to an insurance company upon the plaintiff's untimely death.

Using Multiple Insurance Companies - For larger settlements, it often makes sense to purchase annuities for a structured settlement from several different companies, dividing the settlement between those companies. This can provide you with protection in the event that a company that issued annuities for your settlement package goes into bankruptcy - even in the event that one of the companies defaults in part or in full on your settlement payments, you would still receive full payment from the other companies

CATAGORY

2009-06-26T20:24:00.001-07:00

Secured Loan Calculator

CATAGORY

2009-06-26T20:23:00.000-07:00

# ADSENSE TIPS AND TRICKS (1)
# BEAUTY CREAMS CANDIES FREE T-SHIRTS books (1)
# BLOGGER HACKS TIPS(increase glog traffic) (1)
# entertainment (1)
# GADGETS TIPS TRICKS PRICE (1)
# MOBILE TIPS (1)
# PSP HACKS AND TRICKS (1)
# VERY SPECIAL PLACES ON EARTH
# earn online

great how to's software hacks

2009-06-26T14:29:00.000-07:00

(1)How to Change User Agent String in Firefox to Emulate iPhone

(2)How to Make 720p High Definition Screencast Videos for YouTubeThis tutorial will show you to how record and produce 720p High Definition

(3)Browse the Web Faster on a Slow Internet Connection

(4)Make a Mobile Friendly Version of your Blog with Google Reader

(5)browse-web-faster-on-slow-internet

(6)FeedDemon 3 - The Perfect Twitter Client

(7)Vista SP2: How to Uninstall Windows Vista Service Pack 2

How to Change User Agent String in Firefox to Emulate iPhone

2009-06-26T14:23:00.001-07:00

Here are simple instructions on how to change the default user agent of your web browser such that it emulates Apple iPhone.

The advantage is that you can browse websites that are designed specifically for the iPhone using a desktop browser. Also, you can read free magazines as they are only available to visitors who use the Safari browser inside the iPhone.

Emulate iPhone User Agent

The user agent string for iPhone mobile phone is as below:

Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU like Mac OS X; en) AppleWebKit/420+ (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/3.0 Mobile/1A543a Safari/419.3

Step 1: Install the User Agent extension for Firefox. If you are using Apple Safari, you can directly change the user agent to iPhone or iPod Touch from the developer’s tool bar. How to change User Agent in Google Chrome.

Step 2: Restart Firefox.

Step 3: Go to Tools -> User Agent Switcher and add a new user agent using the settings below:

Description: Apple iPhone
User Agent: Mobile Safari 1.1.3 (iPhone; U; CPU like Mac OS X; en)
App Name: AppleWebKit/420+ (KHTML, like Gecko)
App Version: Version/3.0
Platform: Mobile/1A543a Safari/419.3

Now switch the user agent to iPhone and most websites would render their mobile or iPhone specific layouts to your browser.

The Safari user agent string for iPhone is similar to the user agent string for Safari on Mac or Windows except that it contains an iPhone platform name and the mobile version number. The platform name for Safari on iPod touch is iPod.

How to Make 720p High Definition Screencast Videos for YouTubeThis tutorial will show you to how record and produce 720p High Definition (HD) screenca

2009-06-26T14:22:00.001-07:00

This tutorial will show you to how record and produce 720p High Definition (HD) screencast videos (Widescreen) for YouTube using Camtasia Studio, the best screencasting tool for Windows that will soon be available on Mac.

HD video mostly refers to web video with display resolution of either 1280×720 (720p) or 1920×1080 (1080i or 1080p - full HD). YouTube, at the moment, only supports 720p HD resolution with a 16:9 (non-square pixels) aspect ratio and 24fps frame rate. Watch the clip to know how a 16:9 widescreen video is different from the 640×480 4:3 standard definition video.

Ok, so let’s get started. You need the following software to make 720p HD videos for YouTube with any fake black border around the video:

1. Camtasia Studio - download a 30 day trial for free. This will act like a virtual high definition video camcorder for your computer screen.

2. Apple QuickTime - for encoding with the H.264 video codec for HD quality on YouTube.

3. Any computer with a decent processor - long HD videos may take some time to render on a slow machine.

When you begin the screen recording process, make sure that the recording dimensions are set to 1280 pixels x 720 pixels.

From the Camtasia Recorder, go to Tools -> Options, change video configuration to manual and set the screen capture rate to 30 frames per second. Under audio format, use PCM with 44.100 kHz 16 bit Stereo. Save these settings and record your screencast video.

Once you are done with the recording and editing process, it’s time to produce your screencast video in HD format for YouTube. You may either use the MP4 or MOV formats for the output video as they both use the same MPEG-4 / H.264 codec.

HD Using .MOV format

Open the Production wizard in Camtasia (choose "Produce video as") and select "custom production settings". Use Quicktime Movie (mov) as the output format and under QuickTime options, use the following settings:

Frame Rate: 30 fps; Quality: Best; Key frames: Automatic
Export Size Settings (dimensions): 1280 x 720 HD
Sound: 44.1 kHz, 16 bit Stereo

HD using MP4 format

Select Flash Output (MP4/SWF) in the Production wizard and use a template with no controls. Under video, select MP4 with a frame rate of 30 fps and change the audio options to at least 96 kbps. Manually set the video dimensions to 1280 (width) x 720 (height). The MP4 settings are courtesy Matt Pierce.

Upload HD to YouTube

Now that your HD screencast is ready, upload the file to YouTube. Once the video is uploaded and available for viewing, you may not immediately see the "Watch in HD" link as it can take anywhere between 5-15 minutes for YouTube to provide an alternate HD format.

If you see a green bar on the video page that says "this video is still being processed. Video quality may improve once processing is complete," it means that YouTube could recognize your recently uploaded screencast video as HD.

How to Embed HD YouTube Videos

If you like to embed HD videos from YouTube into a web page such that readers can directly watch the high definition version of the video without having to click the "HD" button in the YouTube player, just add &ap=%2526fmt%3D22 to the YouTube embed code in two places:


value="http://www.youtube.com/v/Q1l&fs=1&ap=%2526fmt%3D22">





src="http://youtube.com/v/Q1l&hl=en&fs=1&ap=%2526fmt%3D22"

type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always"

  allowfullscreen="true" width="480" height="295">

If that was a bit confusing, view the source code of this page that also includes an HD screencast created with Camtasia.

Linking to HD 720p YouTube Videos

You now know how to embed an HD video clip on a web page but consider another scenario where you have to link to an HD video on YouTube.

If you use the default video link provided by YouTube, it would only show the standard quality video unless someone hits the HD button on the YouTube player.

To directly link to the high-definition version of the video, simply add &fmt=22 to the video URL and anyone who clicks that link can watch your screencast video in widescreen and full HD quality. See example:

Standard Quality: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q1lsbA8RhiI

Full HD: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q1lsbA8RhiI&fmt=22

YouTube HD Alternatives

Other than YouTube, you may upload HD screencast videos to other sites like Vimeo, blip.tv, Motion Box or even Daily Motion which is not just free but imposes no limits on the video duration and file size. Feeling confused? Check this detailed comparison of HD video sites on CNET by Josh Lowensohn to understand which site would suit your requirement best.

I am quite happy with the HD quality of YouTube videos and best of all, the service is absolutely free with no bandwidth limits. If you are looking to further widen the reach of your HD video clips, check other services that may help you upload videos to multiple sites at once.

Browse the Web Faster on a Slow Internet Connection

2009-06-26T14:19:00.000-07:00

f your current Internet speed is very slow and you are living in an area where broadband connections are still not available, here are some ideas to help you download web pages faster on your computer. You may use the same tips to improve your web browsing experience on a sluggish USB modem.

Surf the Web Faster on Slow Internet

1. Turn off web images, the Adobe Flash plug-in, Java Applets and JavaScript from your browser settings as these files are often the bulkiest elements of any web page.

2. Increase the size of your browser cache. If the static parts of a site (like background graphics, CSS, etc) are stored in the local cache, your browser can safely skip downloading these files when you re-visit the site in future thus improving speed.

3. Sometimes the slow DNS server of your ISP can be a bottleneck so switch to OpenDNS as it can resolve website URLs into IP addresses more quickly. If you aren’t too happy about OpenDNS redirecting your Google queries, follow this simple hack.

4. Finch can serve a light-weight version of any website in real-time that is free of all bells and whistles. For instance, the New York Times homepage with all external resources can weigh more than a MB but Finch trims down the size by 90% so the site loads more quickly on a slow web connection.

5. Flinch (mentioned at #4) is good for reading regular websites but if you just need to check the latest articles published on your favorite blogs, use BareSite. This service will automatically detect the associated feed of a website and render content quickly inside a minimalist interface.

6. The Google Transcoder service at google.com/gwt/n can split large web pages into smaller chunks that will download more quickly on your computer (or mobile phone).

7. Monitor your Internet speed to determine hours when you get the maximum download speed from the ISP. Maybe you can then change your surfing schedule a bit and browse more during these "off peak" hours.

8. You can use a text browser like Lynx or Elinks for even faster browsing. It downloads only the HTML version of web pages thus reducing the overall bandwidth required to render websites.

9. When searching for web pages on Google, you can click the "Cache" link to view the text version of a web page stored in the Google Cache. Alternatively, install this GM script as it adds a "cached text only" link near every "Cached" link on Google Search pages.

10. Move your web activities offline as far as possible. You can send & receive emails, write blogs and even read feeds in an offline environment. Also see: Save Web Pages for offline reading.

11. You can interact with websites like Flickr, Google Docs, Slideshare, etc. using simple email messages. Uploading a new document to Google Docs via email would require less bandwidth than doing it in the browser because you are avoiding a trip to the Google Docs website.

12. Applying the same logic, you may also consider using tools like Web In Mail or Email The Web as they help you browse websites via email. Just put the URL of a page (e.g., cnn.com) in the subject field of your email message and these services will send you the actual page in the reply.

13. Bookmarklets are like shortcuts to your favorite web services. You neither have to open the Gmail Inbox for composing a new email message nor do you have to visit Google Translate for translating a paragraph of text. Add relevant bookmarklets to your browser bar and reduce the number of steps required to accomplish a task.

14. Use the netstat command to determine processes, other than web browsers, that may be secretly connecting to Internet in the background. Some of these processes could be consuming precious bandwidth but you can block them using the Firewall.

15. Use URL Snooper to determine non-essential host names that a website is trying to connect while downloading a web page. You may block them in future via the hosts file or use Adblock Plus to filter out advertising banners on web pages.

16. If you don’t want to spoil your web surfing experience by stripping images and other graphic elements from a web page, get Opera Turbo. It will first fetch the requested web page on to its own server and then send it to your machine in a compressed format. Opera Turbo won’t change the layout of a web site but can lower the image resolution so that they load faster on slow Internet.

17. Change the user agent of your desktop browser to that of a mobile phone like Apple’s iPhone or Windows Mobile. This will help you browse certain web sites like Google News, WSJ, etc. much faster because they’ll serve you a light-weight and less cluttered mobile version of their sites thinking you’re on a mobile phone.

Make a Mobile Friendly Version of your Blog with Google Reader

2009-06-26T14:18:00.001-07:00

You blog design may be perfectly optimized for the desktop screen but there are lot of people out there who frequently check your website for new content using their mobile phones.

They are not interested in the sidebars, navigation areas and other design elements - all they want to see is a simple listing of your blog posts in reverse chronological order. If they like to read a post, they can click the title and a mobile friendly version of that page should open on the screen of their cell phone.

You may not be a geek or may have the time to create a mobile edition of your blog so here are two simple hacks to help you out - your blog content won’t just look extremely readable on a mobile phone screen, it will also load very fast.

1. Google Reader - The Ten Second Solution

Google Reader can generate an excellent mobile view of your RSS feed without any effort. Just append your feed address to the following URL and your mobile blog is ready.

http://www.google.com/reader/m/view/feed/[feed_address]

And here’s a live example - use your mobile phone to see the awesome page rendering

http://www.google.com/reader/m/view/feed/http://feeds.labnol.org/labnol

Call this link "Mobile Site" and place it somewhere at the top of your blog design so mobile phone users will notice it instantly and switch to the mobile view.

2. The next solution is to create a free account at mofuse.com and they’ll give a personal mobile website with a .mobi address - something like http://labnol.mofuse.mobi/.

If you have self-hosted blog like on WordPress or Blogger Custom domains, you can easily setup the mobile edition of your site on a subdomain (e.g. m.labnol.org) - it is short and your users can easily guess the URL since almost all popular sites now follow the m. convention.

WordPress users are lucky as there’s a plugin that will automatically detect if the client is a mobile phone browser and it then renders a mobile friendly version of the blog to the visitor.

Browse the Web Faster on a Slow Internet Connection

2009-06-26T14:17:00.002-07:00

Surf the Web Faster on Slow Internet

1. Turn off web images, the Adobe Flash plug-in, Java Applets and JavaScript from your browser settings as these files are often the bulkiest elements of any web page.

6. The Google Transcoder service at google.com/gwt/n can split large web pages into smaller chunks that will download more quickly on your computer (or mobile phone).

8. You can use a text browser like Lynx or Elinks for even faster browsing. It downloads only the HTML version of web pages thus reducing the overall bandwidth required to render websites.

10. Move your web activities offline as far as possible. You can send & receive emails, write blogs and even read feeds in an offline environment. Also see: Save Web Pages for offline reading.

FeedDemon 3 - The Perfect Twitter Client

2009-06-26T14:17:00.001-07:00

FeedDemon 3, which is available for download here, includes some new features that turn this already-brilliant RSS reader into an almost perfect Twitter client for Windows. Here’s why:

1. Support for Short URLs

If any of the tweets includes a URL that has been shortened using TinyURL or any other URL shortening service, you can simply hover the mouse to know the real "long" URL. See animation.

2. Subscribe to your Twitter Timeline

FeedDemon is one of the few RSS readers in town that support authenticated feeds. That means you can subscribe to your Twitter Friend’s timeline in FeedDemon as long as you know your Twitter username and password.

Such a thing is not possible in Google Reader since it doesn’t "official" support RSS feeds that requires a password.

3. Twitter Avatars

When you subscribe to any Twitter search feed in FeedDemon, it always will show profile image of the person who made that tweet. This is again very helpful in scanning large results especially when you use the newspaper layout with two columns.

4. Search Twitter from FeedDemon

FeedDemon, by default, includes the Twitter search engine so you search tweets directly from the address bar of FeedDemon without having to fire your web browser.

5. Get Tweets via Desktop Alerts

In FeedDemon, you can select a group of feeds that will pop-up desktop alerts as soon as new items are published in that feed. Go to Tools -> Options -> Desktop Alerts and choose all your Twitter feeds. This will help you track Twitter even while FeedDemon stays minimized.

6. Intelligent Hyperlinks

When you subscribe to a Twitter feed inside Google Reader, all the tweets are plain text and just link to the original status message. FeedDemon, on the hand, will auto-discover Twitter usernames, web URLs and #hashtags in the tweet and converts them into hyperlinks. See screenshot.

7. Send Links to Twitter

This feature is not available in FeedDemon 3 by default but let me share a quick hack that will help you post links from FeedDemon to Twitter (similar to Tweet This button on blogs).

Open the "SendTo" folder present inside the default installation folder of FeedDemon 3:

C:\Program Files\FeedDemon\Data\SendTo

Create a new file "twitter.xml" in this folder and copy-paste the following text inside this file:


 template="http://twitter.com/home?status=Reading {title} {url}" />

Now restart FeedDemon and you’ll see a new "Twitter" option under the Send to menu as shown here.

8. Send replies from FeedDemon

If you are reading your Twitter timeline or a Twitter search feed inside FeedDemon, you can reply to any tweet directly from FeedDemon via the new "twitter reply" icon in the menu.

Vista SP2: How to Uninstall Windows Vista Service Pack 2

2009-06-26T14:16:00.002-07:00

If you need to remove Windows Vista SP2 from your computer, follow these simple steps:

Open Control Panel -> Programs -> Uninstall a Program

Or you may type appwiz.cpl in the search box available on the Windows Start Menu.

Click Service Pack for Microsoft Windows (KB948465), and then click Uninstall.

Follow the instructions and this should completely uninstall Vista Service Pack 2 from your computer.

Do I have Windows Vista SP2?

Use the Control Panel applet “Programs and Features” and select “View installed updates” from the top left of the task pane, under Windows, look for KB948465.

Change Your Browser Homepage and See Something New Everyday

2009-06-26T14:16:00.001-07:00

When it comes to choosing a homepage for the browser, we all have different preferences. Some people prefer a blank start page (as it loads immediately), some may be using a search engine for the home page while others may have set multiple homepages as it helps them check all their favorites sites in one go.

The only problem is that these are all static start page so you will always see the same website every time you open the browser. If you find this setting boring or monotonous, here are some web addresses that will show you something new and interesting each time you open the browser.

1. Flickr Photos - This will load a random set of most interesting pictures from Flickr, the photo sharing website.

2. Wikipedia - This will open some random article from the Wikipedia Encyclopedia - replace "en" in the URL to see articles in your own language - de for Deutsch, es for Español, it for Italiano and so on.

3. Digg - This will load a random web page that was also popular on Digg. This will work even if you hide the Diggbar.

4. Delicious - This will open a web page that has recently gone popular on Delicious, the social bookmarking website. You can also tweak the delicious URL to load web pages related to your own interests. For instance, delicious.com/popular/cricket?random=1 will only show cricket related websites in the start page.

5. Dictionary - Learn the meaning of some new English word every time you load the browser. Available for most other popular languages as well including Arabic, Hindi, Chinese, Persian (Farsi), etc.

6. StumbleUpon - This will open a random website that is popular among members of the StumbleUpon community. You can also add topics or URLs to the StumbleUpon bookmark to limit the level of randomness.

For instance, stumbleupon.com/toolbar/#stumblethru=flickr.com will only display pictures from Flickr.com while stumbleupon.com/toolbar/#topic=Business will show web pages that are under the "business" category.

Just drag any of these URLs to the browser’s home icon and prepare yourself to see something unexpected each time you open the web browser.

Find & Download Online Documents using Firefox

2009-06-26T14:15:00.004-07:00

There are certain limitations with document search engines that now all over the web.

First, they are written as fixed wrappers over Google or Yahoo and it’s therefore not possible to change the underlying web search engine for finding documents. The other limitation is the search interface itself. They present results in a Google like format which is good for displaying regular web pages but you need something extra for online documents.

Enter OutWit - a free add-on for Firefox that turns your web browser into a proper document finding application. With OutWit installed, you can use Firefox to locate online files as well as documents that may be stored on your local hard drive.

Here’s how it work - start OutWit and type your query in the Firefox search box. You may also use the drop down to select any other search engine that is installed inside your Firefox.

Outwit will scan the search results and display documents in a Windows Explorer like view - you can hover the mouse over any file to read the properties or even sort the search results by size, document type, web location and so on. You can right click and save the documents locally or collect them in a virtual bin and do a batch download later.

The next useful feature in Outwit is that it lets you browse (and download) all documents that may be linked from a web page. For instance, I could open the Investor Relations page of a corporate site and download all the Quarterly Earnings report that match a certain criteria - for e.g., file names that begin with 2008_Q will give me all reports for the year 2008 and such a filter is easy to implement in Outwit.

Outwit is available for the latest beta version of Firefox and works across Windows, Linux and Mac OS.

Windows 7 Starter Edition for Netbooks

2009-06-26T14:15:00.003-07:00

Netbooks - low cost and less powerful laptop computers - will run better on Windows 7 than Windows Vista. WSJ says that Microsoft will release Windows 7 Starter edition for netbook that will be cheaper but will have certain limits:

1. You can only run three applications simultaneously on Windows 7. So if you have email, web browser and an anti-virus software running on the machine, you will to shut down either one of these in order to start another program like iTunes or Word 2010.

2. The UI interface of Windows 7 Starter version will not be as impressive as other versions of Windows 7 (maybe to reduce the memory requirements).

Windows 7 Starter may actually work because by 2010, a lot of applications will become web based you really need only one software at a time and that’s your web browser.

The other workaround for running multiple application on Windows 7 starter could be a virtualization software like VMWare or Microsoft Virtual PC.

Windows 7 may hit the retail shelves sometime in October this year.

Download Microsoft Office 2007 SP2 - Outlook Gets a Performance Boost

2009-06-26T14:15:00.001-07:00

Service Pack 2 for Microsoft Office 2007 significantly improves the performance of Microsoft Outlook and also adds support for OpenDocument format in Word, Excel and PowerPoint 2007.

With SP2 installed, your Microsoft Office 2007 programs can read & write documents in the ODF format without requiring external plug-ins. The service pack also adds the Save as PDF functionality by default to all programs that are part of the Office 2007 suite.

Here’s a complete list of changes and issues that have been fixed through Service Pack 2 (SP2) of Office 2007. It’s a major upgrade (with 600+ fixes) and Jane Liles says that Outlook 2007 with SP2 is 26 percent faster on a set of common e-mail tasks and users will experience considerable speed improvements on common Outlook operations like launching, synchronizing and searching.

Download Microsoft Office 2007 SP2

Office 2007 SP2 is available for download through Windows Update or you can follow the direct link to the SP2 installer on the Microsoft Download Center. The file name is office2007sp2-kb953195-fullfile-en-us.exe and it’s around 290 MB in size. You may also order a slipstream copy of Office 2007 SP2 on a DVD here.

This release will also update stand-alone viewers for Excel, PowerPoint and Word 2007 so even if you are using an older version of Office, you may still want to checkout this update.

Outlook 2007 also includes fixes related to slow IMAP access so that may be good news for users who check their Gmail emails on Outlook via IMAP. For POP access, Outlook now downloads the newest mail first instead of the oldest mail. SP2 also fixes a number of issues related to RSS feeds in Outlook 2007.

Why You Should Use Prism with Firefox

2009-06-26T14:14:00.001-07:00

Prism is an interesting new application that helps you create desktop shortcuts to your favorite websites in few clicks. These website shortcuts can either be placed on the desktop screen, the Windows start menu or the Dock in Mac OS.

And when you double-click any of these shortcut icons, the associated website will open in a new Firefox window with a very minimalist interface. Firefox windows created through Prism do not support tabs, there are no bookmarks, the address bar is read-only and the right-click (contextual) menu has options related to copy-paste only.

Prism for Firefox - Advantages & Tips

You may be wondering why would anyone want to view a website inside a Firefox window that is so limited? Well, here are a couple of reasons why you may find Prism for Firefox very useful:

Crash Proof - Prism creates a new instance of Firefox for every website (similar to Google Chrome) so if any of these windows suffers a crash, you can still continue working with other websites. In standard Firefox, one bad site (or non-responsive script) can shut down your entire browser session.

Light-weight Browser - Running Firefox through Prism is fast because the browser won’t load any of your existing extensions or themes that are normally responsible for slowing down the browser.

Login into Multiple Web Accounts at Once

If you have two or more web accounts (on say Gmail) and need to check mails across all these accounts simultaneously, Prism makes that easy. Just create different desktop shortcuts for the same Gmail website and assign a meaningful name to each of these icons (e.g., Gmail - Personal, Gmail - Work, etc.).

You can now open these "web apps" and login into multiple accounts on the same site simultaneously.

Check your Mails at Start-up

If the first thing that you do at the computer is checking emails, it may be a good idea to create a desktop shortcut for your web mail website (via Prism) and copy that shortcut icon in the Start-up folder so that your inbox loads automatically whenever your start the computer.

Load External Website in the Same Prism Window

When you click an external hyperlink on a Prism-loaded website, the target site will open in your default browser which may be IE, Google Chrome or Firefox itself.

You can however override this default setting such that certain external domains / sub-domains open in the same window. Here’s how:

First, open the configuration file (webapp.ini) associated with your desktop shortcut. You can find the location of this file through properties of your website shortcut icon. In Vista, the default location is:

C:\Users\[user-name]\AppData\Roaming\WebApps\[your-app-name]@prism.app\

Now add a new parameter called "include" listing all domains that should be opened in the web app and not the default browser. Separate multiple uris with commas as in this example:

[Parameters]
id=google.docs@prism.app
name=Google Docs
uri=http://docs.google.com/
include=*google.com,*labnol.org

For Power Users - Here’s one more reason why you may want to use Prism with Firefox.

I normally have 8-12 tabs open in my Firefox browser but when it’s time to call it a day, I simply close the browser and the session gets saved in Firefox. When I start the browser again, Firefox will auto-open all the previous sites so I can resume from where I left off the previous day.

Sounds good but there’s a slight problem here. Sometimes I just need to check my web emails and don’t want Firefox to load the other 8 sites that are part of my previous session.

That’s where I can use a Prism shortcut to check my email and it won’t override my last day’s session which is still saved in (standard) Firefox

How to Take Screenshot Images of Computer Screen

2009-06-26T14:13:00.002-07:00

A screenshot, screen capture or screen dump, is a static picture of your computer screen’s display. The picture is a digital image taken by the operating system or by screenshot software and can be saved as a GIF, JPEG, TIFF, BMP, PNG or any other image format.

With the browser of your choice, visit your blog’s main page. Make sure that this browser window is the active window in full view (you may wish to maximize your browser).
Press the Print Screen key (typically located at the top right of your keyboard) and the Alt key simultaneously (Alt+Print Screen). This captures your active window and saves the image to your clipboard. Note: Some keyboards have an F-key lock which must be turned off.
Open a graphic program such as Paint (found via the Windows Start menu under All Programs > Accessories). In Paint, using the menu at the top of the application, click Edit > Paste.
You may need to resize your image to make sure that is under the 800x 600 pixel dimension limit. To do this, click Image > Stretch/Skew
Change the percentage from 100 to 75 (or thereabouts) for both the horizontal and vertical stretch fields. Click OK.
Save your file by clicking File > Save As… Specify your file name. Change the ‘Save as File Type’ dropdown from BMP to GIF to reduce the file size.

Screenshots for Kindle

Install Evernote on BlackBerry without the App World

2009-06-26T14:13:00.001-07:00

If you have a BlackBerry and are located outside US or carry an unsupported model of BlackBerry (like the Pearl or Curve 8600 series), continue reading.

Evernote, the popular web clipping software, is now available for BlackBerry mobile phones as well in addition to iPhone and Windows Mobile.

With Evernote installed, you can create new text notes or edit existing ones, upload pictures (aka Snapshot note) or record voice memos (audio recording). You can also access your existing Evernote notes, search by keywords, filter by tags, or simply browse.

Since Evernote can easily sync notes across all devices, anything that you clip inside the BlackBerry will instantly become available on the web or your Mac / Windows PC.

Initially, Evernote for Blackberry was available for download only through the BlackBerry App World (under the Productivity & Utility category) but since the store is not available outside US or Canada, Evernote has now provided direct download links to the software as well.

BlackBerry Storm users can either download this ZIP or visit s.evernote.com/stormota from the mobile browser for OTA installation. BlackBerry Bold and BlackBerry Curve (8900) users can get Evernote on their phones via s.evernote.com/bbota or this ZIP.

The other advantage is that with direct links, you can install Evernote on older BlackBerry models as well (like BlackBerry Curve 8600 with OS 4.5).

Watch TV Shows on the Desktop with Joost Media Player

2009-06-26T14:12:00.002-07:00

Joost.com, as you probably know, is a free web service that lets you watch popular TV shows, music videos, podcasts and even some movies on the Internet.

Initially, Joost required users to download a desktop application for watching Internet TV but in December last year, they switched to a website-only model and completely discontinued the Joost software application.

Joost on the Desktop

Now if you enjoy watching videos on Joost but miss their original desktop app, try the new Joost Media Player - it’s an Adobe AIR app that brings the same Joost experience on your desktop outside the web browser.

With Joost Media Player, you can not only view Joost.com’s library of TV shows and music videos but it’s also integrated with Twitter so you can easily share links of videos you are currently watching with your Twitter friends.

Picture in Picture

One of the most useful feature in Joost Desktop is the Picture-in-Picture effect. You can watch videos and browse the Joost library simultaneously - the video will continue to play in a corner while you navigate the other sections.

The Joost Media Player also offers a TV mode where you can watch videos in full screen mode and navigate through different shows as if you were surfing channels on TV.

You can use the arrow keys of your wireless keyboard to "switch channels" on Joost (similar to a remote control) but unlike the Adobe Media Player, there’re no DVR features here so you can’t download or record shows.

Joost video library includes television programmes from CBS, CNBC, Viacom, Comedy Central, MTV, Nickelodeon and more.

Download Windows Vista SP2

2009-06-26T14:12:00.001-07:00

The Service Pack 2 for Windows Vista is now available for public download on Microsoft Download Center. You may either download Vista SP2 as a standalone installer or as an ISO image for burning onto a DVD.

The installer for Vista SP2 (Windows6.0-KB948465-X86.exe) is around 350 MB but if you don’t want to download that big a file, wait until Microsoft pushes the SP2 patch via the Windows Update or Automatic Updates feature as that will only download the essential components.

An important point - you will be able to install Windows Vista SP2 only when your systems are already running Service Pack 1. Microsoft says that they chose not to offer a cumulative SP2 package this time to keep the file size under control.

If you’ve used vLite (or something similar) to slipstream Vista with SP1, you may receive certain errors while installing SP2 due to missing components. In that case, the best option is to either perform an in-place upgrade using your original Windows Vista DVD or reinstall Vista from scratch, then install SP1 followed by a file clean-up and then update to Service Pack 2. Hat tip Mary J.

The Firefox Manual - A Beginner’s Guide

2009-06-26T14:11:00.002-07:00

The first version of Firefox was released in 2004 and since then, some 230 million people world-wide (or 20% of the 1.2 billion strong Internet population) are using Firefox as their primary web browser.

The next graph illustrates the Firefox development process at Mozilla. A core set of 400 developers are responsible for the code that runs Firefox while the rest is a community driven effort. For instance, there are around five hundred people, outside the core developers, who localize Firefox into over 60 languages.

Taking that community effort to the next level, 25 writers (some of them from Mozilla) collaborated over two days to produce an online 110 pages long Firefox Manual.

It’s a visual guide (with plenty of screenshots) to help you learn everything about Firefox browser from using tabs to downloading files to using themes & plugins. The manual is under "free documentation" and also available for download as a PDF ebook.

As power users, you probably know most things that are mentioned in the Firefox manual but you may still want to pass a link of this manual to someone who has just switched (or is planning to make a switch) to Firefox.

Get the Best Screen Capture Software for Free

2009-06-26T14:11:00.001-07:00

Here’s a chance to grab a licensed copy of SnagIt for free. SnagIt, if you are new, is the best screen capture software for Windows that can record screencast videos as well.

Update: The offer has expired.

First download the SnagIt 7 installer and then head over to TechSmith to get a serial number for the software. You may want to hurry up as this offer will expire today at 5 PM EST.

Version 7 is not the latest version of SnagIt but it will definitely have more features that any of the free screenshot tools that you may be using on Windows including Jing. TechSmith launched a similar offer for SnagIt in 2007 as well.

Test Your Web Pages in Different Browsers with Adobe Browser Lab

2009-06-26T14:09:00.002-07:00

Test Your Web Pages in Different Browsers with Adobe Browser Lab

Adobe BrowserLab is a new online service that will help you test the layout of your web pages across a variety of web browsers and operating systems.

Comparing web design in Firefox 3.0 & IE 7.0

You can use the Browser Lab service to view the design of your site in Firefox, Internet Explorer and Safari on both Mac and Windows. BrowserLab works by taking screen shots of your web pages in different browsers on different platforms and then displays these screenshot images side by side for easy comparison.

Though the service doesn’t support Chrome, Opera and some Linux specific browsers, the advantage is that there’s no waiting time and it also offers skinning so you can place renderings one over the other to quickly spot the differences.

Skinning superimposes one screen shot over another

BrowserLab can integrate with Dreamweaver CS4 so you can test web page designs from within the WYSIWYG HTML editor without having to publish pages on to an external web server.

Rotate Your Computer Screen in Windows 7

2009-06-26T14:09:00.001-07:00

The standard orientation of our computer screens is generally horizontal (also known as landscape) but monitors placed in portrait mode (where height becomes greater than the width) can be pretty useful for performing tasks that require lot of scrolling (like reading lengthy web pages).

Windows 7 includes a new option under Display Settings that can help you flip the screen from portrait to landscape mode (and vice-versa) without requiring additional software.

This may come very handy if you are using a dual monitor setup with Windows 7 where you want one screen in the default horizontal mode and other one in vertical mode for reading content.

You’ll still have to manually rotate the other monitor by 90° (as in this screenshot) but that’s a one time task. Hat tip Marcus.

How to Publish Screenshot Images on Twitter

2009-06-26T14:08:00.001-07:00

Whether you need help with an error message or just want to show off your new desktop wallpaper, Twitter can be a good place to share all those screenshot images with the world.

Now capturing screenshots of anything on your desktop screen is easy but let’s explore a couple of ways that will enable you publish these screenshot images on to your Twitter account as a tweet quickly and effortlessly.

TechSmith Jing (Mac & Windows)

With TechSmith Jing, you can quickly grab a screenshot, add some text notes or annotate your image with arrows and basic shapes. Once you are done editing, the image gets uploaded to your free screencast.com account and the URL is automatically copied to the clipboard so you can easily paste that in your tweets.

That’s one way of doing things but let me share another Jing trick here.

Other than Screencast.com, Jing can also upload screenshot images to your Flickr account. Open Twittergram and associate your Flickr account with Twitter using the tag TechSmithJing. Now anything you upload on Flickr through Jing will automatically get pushed to your Twitter stream without you having to tweet about it. How cool.

Kwout (Web Based)

If you need to screen capture a web page for publishing on to Twitter, check out Kwout. You can either copy-paste the web page address that you want to screen capture or use a bookmarklet.

Kwout will help you capture as well host the screenshot image and you can post the link on Twitter directly from Kwout’s site. The very interesting part is that all hyperlinks in the screenshot remain clickable (see example) because Kwout uses an imagemap for screenshots.

ScreenTweetr (Mac, Windows, Linux)

ScreenTweetr is another interesting Adobe AIR app developed by James Ford.

The app stays minimized in the system tray but automatically wakes up as soon you do a screen capture on Mac (Shift-Control-Command-3) or a Windows PC (Print Screen) . It will upload the screenshot image (or the contents of your clipboard) on to Twitpic from where you can tweet it.

Skitch (Email to Twitter)

Like Jing, Skitch is both a screen capture software and a screenshot hosting service. If you have a Mac, you can capture and upload screenshots to Skitch from the desktop itself but Windows users will have to send their screenshots to a secret email address for posting them on to Skitch (see example).

Skitch also provides an "email to twitter" option so you can send in screenshots from iPhone, BlackBerry or your mobile phone to Skitch and the images will then auto-appear in your Twitter timeline.

Windows Tip: Find the Day of the Week for any Given Date Very Quickly

2009-06-26T14:07:00.002-07:00

A question for Windows Vista and Windows 7 users - How can you quickly find the day of the week when you were born without consulting any of the web based date calculators?

You are more likely to open the clock (or “Adjust date and time” module) in your Windows desktop and will then navigate to the date for which you have to calculate the day of the week.

The first step is fine but here’s a tip from PC Mag that will help you jump to specific dates in the Windows Calendar more quickly.

First click the name of the month to view all months of the current year, then click the year to view the last ten years and finally click it one more time to view the entire decades. This 30 second screencast video will walk you through all the steps.

While this trick can help you quickly calculate the day of the week for a given date, the limitation is that it only works with dates that are between 1930 and 2069.

Laptop Stickers for SnagIt & Camtasia Studio Fans

2009-06-26T14:07:00.001-07:00

This is something for fans of SnagIt, Camtasia Studio or Jing.

You can order some cool stickers for your laptop using this form and TechSmith will ship them to your address for free. Thanks Betsy.

All the New Features of Firefox 3.5

2009-06-26T14:06:00.000-07:00

This screencast video has a great overview of all the new features that are part of Firefox 3.5.

The video is embedded on the Mozilla homepage using the HTML 5 video tag and should therefore play in Firefox 3.5 or Google Chrome even without the Flash Player.

Kevin Purdy too has a great rundown of all the new tools & features of Firefox 3.5 including the very useful option to clean Internet history selectively.

Tips for Producing Better Video Slideshows with Animoto

2009-06-26T13:56:00.000-07:00

If you are already using Animoto to create video slideshows of your photos, here are some tips for producing even better video.

Animoto is an easy tool for creating impressive videos out of your boring digital photos in minutes. Just upload your pictures to the Animoto website (or pull them directly from Flickr or Picasa), select a background music to play with your video slideshow, add some text (optional) and you’re done.

Check these pages on YouTube and Twitter to see some more video clips that have been created using Animoto.com.

The basic version of Animoto is free but it limits you to 30 second video clips that aren’t downloadable though you can upload them to YouTube. You can however sign-up for Animoto using this special link and it will give you the option to create one full length video on Animoto for free.

A full length video can be as long as the duration of the song and you can download the video as well though it’s not in HD format.

Animoto Tips for Better Video

While Animoto makes is super easy for your to create professional looking videos without any preparation, a little bit of planning can make your slideshows look even better. Here are some tips from Animoto:

1. When uploading photos to Animoto, always pick photos that have a landscape orientation as portrait photos can sometimes format oddly during the video render process.

2. Animoto will automatically determine the duration of each picture in the video slideshow but if there’re pictures that you really want to emphasize in the video, select the images in the video editor and use the spotlight button.

3. When adding text to your video, always make sure that their pictures on either side of the text slide else your text will lack any moving video in the background.

4. Your choice of music determines the transition speed. If you select a slow classical song, your music video will have slow transitions whereas if you select rock, the transitions will happen fast - go for the latter if you are looking to create MTV style video clips.

5. Animoto consumes around 15-20 images for their 30 second shorts. If you upload more images, they are likely to be discarded in the final video so pick the best shots before starting the render process. For full-length videos, you an upload upto 300 shots but the number of pictures used would really depend on the choice of your music - slow music means less pictures.

6. While most people use Animoto for creating fast slideshows, you can adjust the video speed to 1/2x for a more traditional slideshow.

7. If you want to brand your Animoto slideshows, make sure that the last image in the slideshow is not a photograph but an image of your logo.

CATAGORIES

2009-06-09T23:32:00.001-07:00

CATAGORIES

SOUTH CAROLINA

2009-06-09T23:29:00.001-07:00

Palmetto State (tree), Swamp State, Rice State, South Carolina was originally named in honor of France's Charles IX and then in honor of England's Charles I and Charles II.

South Carolina is located in the Southern Middle Atlantic Coast and is bordered by North Carolina on the north, Atlantic Ocean (east), and Georgia (west).

At 31,117 square mile, South Carolina is the 40th largest state. The highest elevation is Sassafras Mt., in Pickens County at 3,560 feet while the lowest elevation is the Atlantic Ocean at sea level.

The highest temperature recorded was 111° while the lowest temperature was -19°.

National Parks & Monuments include Congaree Swamp, Fort Moultrie, Fort Sumter.

The History

Following exploration of the coast in 1521 by Francisco de Gordillo, the Spanish tried unsuccessfully to establish a colony near present-day Georgetown in 1526, and the French also failed to colonize Parris Island near Fort Royal in 1562.

In colonial days, the state was part of a vast region that Charles I, king of England, granted to Sir Robert Heath in 1629. The region was named Carolana, a word derived from the Latin form of Charles, in reference to the monarch. His son, Charles II, changed the spelling of the region's name to Carolina in 1663. During the 17th century the area now covered by the present state came to be called South Carolina and the area to the north became North Carolina.

The first English settlement was made in 1670 at Albemarle Point on the Ashley River, but poor conditions drove the settlers to the site of Charleston (originally called Charles Town). South Carolina, officially separated from North Carolina in 1729, was the scene of extensive military action during the Revolution and again during the Civil War. The Civil War began in 1861 as South Carolina troops fired on federal Fort Sumter in Charleston Harbor, and the state was the first to secede from the Union.

Points of interest include Fort Sumter National Monument, Fort Moultrie, Fort Johnson, and aircraft carrier USS Yorktown in Charleston Harbor; the Middleton, Magnolia, and Cypress Gardens in Charleston; Cowpens National Battlefield; the Hilton Head resorts; and the Riverbanks 200 and Botanical Garden in Columbia.

Cotton was long the backbone of South Carolina's economy. Today, manufacturing is the state's largest employer, based largely on resources found in South Carolina. The most important products are textiles, chemicals, non-electrical machinery, apparel, and paper and pulp. A valuable forestry industry is supported by 12.2 million acres of woods. Agriculture and commercial fishing remain important. Tourism is another important industry, with many visitors attracted to the Myrtle Beach, Charleston and the sea islands.

South Carolina became the 8th State to Unite under America on May 23, 1788.

The People

Between 1820 and 1920 blacks outnumbered whites in South Carolina. After 1920 the state's white population grew more rapidly than the black population because many blacks migrated to the North. Blacks are still a majority in parts of rural South Carolina, although many blacks have moved to urban areas.

whites constituted 67.2 percent of the population and blacks 29.5 percent. Asians were 0.9 percent of inhabitants; Native Americans, many of whom were members of the Catawba people, were 0.3 percent, and those of mixed heritage or not reporting ethnicity were 2 percent. Native Hawaiians and other Pacific Islanders numbered 1,628. Hispanics, who may be of any race, were 2.4 percent of the population

The 1998 census put South Carolina population at 3,836,000. The State Capital is Columbia, other major cities or towns include Charleston, North Charleston, Greenville, Rock Hill, Mount Pleasant, Spartanburg, Sumter, Hilton Head Island and Florence.

WYOMIN

2009-06-09T23:28:00.000-07:00

Cowboy State, Equality State, Big Sky, Wyoming was named from two Delaware Indian words mecheweamiing, which are translated 'at the big flats' (large plains).

Wyoming is located in the Northern Great Plains (Rocky Mountains) and is bordered by Montana on the north and northwest, South Dakota & Nebraska (east), Colorado & Utah (south), and Idaho & Utah (west).

At 97,818 square miles, Wyoming is the 9th largest state. The highest elevation is Gannett Peak in the Wind River Range at 13,804 ft. The lowest elevation is the Belle Fourche River in Crook County at 3,099 feet.

National Parks & Monuments include Grand Teton, Yellowstone, Devils Tower, Fossil Butte.

The highest temperature recorded was 114° while the lowest was -66°.

The History

The Crow hunted the lush grasslands of northeastern Wyoming until they were pushed westward into the mountains by the Sioux. The Sioux and other tribes were greatly troubled by the increasing numbers of explorers and settlers who entered the region after the Civil War, especially after the opening of the Bozeman Trail in 1864. In the early 1860s, Indians forced stagecoaches to use the more southerly Overland Trail. Conflicts with the Sioux were especially common in the Powder River valley. But Native Americans had been largely subdued by the late 1870s. The Arapaho were placed on the Wind River Reservation, while their former enemies, the Shoshone, moved their herds to grasslands throughout Wyoming. Learn more about Wyoming Native Americans.

French trappers and explorers may have reached the area in the middle to late 18th century. The first documented visit was by a U.S. citizen and fur trapper, John Colter, who passed through Montana with the Lewis and Clark expedition, then returned to explore the Yellowstone country in 1807. The overland party crossed through Teton Pass in 1811 en route to found Astoria, Oregon. Robert Stuart returned from Astoria and pioneered the Oregon Trail through Wyoming in 1812-13. The first permanent trading post (Fort Laramie) was built in 1834. Brigham Young led the first party of Mormons across Wyoming in 1847, and thousands of people crossed Wyoming’s mountain passes as part of the California gold rush of 1849. The first heavy influx of settlers were lured to the region by the discovery of gold at South Pass in 1867. The greatest encouragement was probably the completion of the Wyoming portion of the Union Pacific Railroad in 1868.

Portions of what is now Wyoming were at one time claimed by Spain, France, and England, though none of them established much of a presence there.

The U.S. acquired Wyoming in five steps: 1) The Louisiana Purchase from France in 1803. 2) The Treaty of 1819 with Spain. 3) Cession by the republic of Texas in 1836 and partition from Texas after it was annexed in 1845. Western Wyoming was obtained by 4) The 1846 Oregon Treaty with Great Britain, and 5) The 1848 Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, which ended the Mexican War.

Carved out of portions of Dakota, Utah, and Idaho territories, Wyoming became the 44th State to Unite under America on July 10, 1890.

The People

92.1 percent of the people are of European descent. Native Americans make up 2.3 percent of the state's total population. A majority of them live on the Wind River Reservation, 900,000 hectares (2.2 million acres) in west central Wyoming, the home of the Shoshone and Arapaho tribes. Some 0.8 percent of the population is black, 0.6 percent is Asian, 0.1 percent is Native Hawaiian or other Pacific Islander, and 4.3 percent are of mixed heritage or did not report ethnicity in the 2000 census. Hispanics, who can be of any race, represent 6.4 percent of the population.

The 1998 census put Wyoming's population at 481,000. The State Capital is Cheyenne, other Major Cities or Towns include Casper, Laramie, Rock Springs, Gillette, Sheridan, Green River, Evanston, Riverton and Rawlins.

TEXAS

2009-06-09T23:27:00.000-07:00

Lone Star State, Texas was named from the Caddo Indian word teysha, or tejas, which means "hello friend."

Texas is located the South (Gulf of Mexico) and Central Lowlands and is bordered by Arkansas on the northeast, Louisiana (east), Gulf of Mexico (south), Mexico (southwest), New Mexico (northwest), and Oklahoma (north).

At 266,874 square miles, Texas is the 2nd biggest state. The highest elevation is Guadalupe Peak in Culberson County at 8,749 feet while the lowest elevation is the Gulf of Mexico at sea level.

The highest temperature recorded was 120° while the lowest was -23°.

National Parks & Monuments include Big Bend, Big Thicket, Guadalupe Mountains, Alibates Flint Quarries.

The History

In 1519, the Spanish explorer Pineda made a map of the Texas coast. This event marked the beginning of Spain's rule in Texas.

Nine years later, in 1528, Cabeza de Vaca was shipwrecked near Galveston. His small band met many Indian tribes while wandering through the Texas area, but he finally came to a Spanish settlement. He made his way to Mexico City with tales of the fabled "Seven Cities of Gold."

In the early 1540s, the explorer Coronado, in an attempt to find the seven cities, trekked through present New Mexico, West Texas and as far north as Kansas. Though he found no cities of gold, he strengthened Spain's claim on Texas. Today, an archeological site linked to Coronado is being studied by a team of archeologists in the Texas Panhandle.

Corpus Christi de la Isleta, established near El Paso in 1682, was the first Spanish mission and pueblo in Texas.

The French claim on Texas rests on La Salle's visit in 1685. He established Fort St. Louis in the Matagorda Bay area. Two years later, he was killed by his own men. By 1690, Indians and disease had destroyed the small French force. In 1995, a team of Texas Historical Commission archeologists discovered the Belle, one of La Salle's frigates, in the murky waters of Matagorda Bay. In 1996, the exact location of Fort St. Louis was pinpointed near Victoria. These discoveries represent two of the most important archeological finds in recent history, and promise to provide many answers to questions about this period in history.

Alarmed by the French presence in Texas and the French settlements in the Louisiana area, the Spaniards established in 1690 Mission San Francisco de los Tejas, the first East Texas mission.

In 1718, with the establishment of Mission San Antonio de Valero (the Alamo), the city of San Antonio was founded.

In 1821, the year Mexico gained independence from Spain, Stephen F. Austin received permission from the Mexican government to settle a colony of 300 families, now known as the "Old Three Hundred," in southeast Texas. Although Anglo Americans were already living in Texas at the time, Austin's settlement was the official beginning of Anglo American colonization in Texas. By 1836, 35,000 to 50,000 people had settled in Texas.

Early in 1835, Stephen F. Austin announced that he was convinced that war with Mexico was necessary to secure freedom. Growing tension in Texas was the result of cultural, political and religious differences between the Anglo Americans and the Mexican government. In response to the unrest, Antonio Lopez de Santa Anna, the president of Mexico, reinforced Mexican troops in Texas. A battle fought at Gonzales on Oct. 2, 1835, in which the Mexican forces were thwarted in their efforts to retrieve a cannon, gave rise to the famous flag bearing the words "Come and Take It." Though there were earlier minor skirmishes, the Battle of Gonzales is generally considered to be the first battle for Texas' independence.

The Battle of the Alamo, lasting nearly two weeks, ended on March 6, 1836, with the deaths of all its defenders (numbering about 190). The Mexican army of Santa Anna numbered 4,000 to 5,000 during its final charge. Among those killed were David Crockett, Jim Bowie and William B. Travis. A subsequent massacre of Texans who had surrendered at Goliad on March 27 led to the battle cry of Texas' independence, "Remember the Alamo! Remember Goliad!"

The Texas Declaration of Independence was enacted at Washington-on-the-Brazos on March 2, 1836. The Battle of San Jacinto was fought on April 21, 1836, near the present city of Houston. Santa Anna's entire force of 1,600 men was killed or captured by Gen. Sam Houston's army of 800 Texans; only nine Texans died. This decisive battle resulted in Texas' independence from Mexico.

In 1836, five sites served as temporary capitals of Texas (Washington-on-the-Brazos, Harrisburg, Galveston, Velasco and Columbia) before Sam Houston moved the capital to Houston in 1837. In 1839, the capital was moved to the new town of Austin.

Texas was annexed to the United States as the 28th state on Dec. 29, 1845. Texas seceded from the United States and joined the Confederate States of America on Jan. 28, 1861. Texas officially was readmitted to the Union on March 30, 1870, following the period of Reconstruction. The present Texas Constitution was ratified on Feb. 15, 1876.

On Nov. 22, 1963, President John F. Kennedy was assassinated during a motorcade through downtown Dallas. Vice-President Lyndon B. Johnson of Texas was sworn in as president aboard the presidential airplane at Dallas' Love Field airport that same day.

Texan Territory was an independent republic before statehood. Texas became the 28th state to Unite under America on December 29, 1845.

The People

A large number of Mexicans and Mexican Americans live in southern Texas, especially along the Río Grande and in such cities as San Antonio and Corpus Christi. Many of them still speak Spanish in their homes and read the Spanish - language newspapers published in several southern Texas cities. Many families emigrated from Germany and other parts of central Europe to central Texas in the middle of the l9th century. The names of some of the towns in central Texas, such as New Braunfels, Fredericksburg, and Schulenburg, reflect their German origin.

In 2000 whites constituted 71 percent of the population, blacks 11.5 percent, Asians 2.7 percent, Native Americans 0.6 percent, Native Hawaiians and other Pacific Islanders 0.1 percent, and those of mixed heritage or not reporting ethnicity 14.2 percent. Hispanics, who may be of any race, were 32 percent of the people.

The 1998 census put Texas' population at 19,760,000. The State Capital is Austin, other major cities or towns include Amarillo, Abilene, Beaumont, Brownsville, Corpus Christi, Dallas, El Paso, Fort Worth, Galveston, Houston, San Angelo, Wichita Falls.

ARIZONA

2009-06-09T23:22:00.000-07:00

The Land

The Grand Canyon State or Copper State, Arizona takes its name from the Indian word Arizonac, meaning "little spring" or "young spring"

Located in the Southwest, Arizona is bordered by Utah (north), Colorado (northeast), New Mexico (east), California & Nevada (west, across the Colorado River)

At 114,007 square miles, Arizona is the 6th biggest state. The highest elevation is Humphreys Peak in Coconino County at 12,633 feet. The lowest elevation is the Colorado River in Yuma County at 70 feet.

Arizona’s clean, clear, dry air and warm weather attracts older people looking for a retirement home as well as people with respiratory health problems. The state’s population has tripled in the last thirty years. Today, one out of three Arizonans live in booming Phoenix and Tucson.

The highest temperature recorded was 128° while the Lowest was -40°

National Parks & Monuments include Canyon de Chelly, Casa Grande Ruins, Chiricahua, Hohokam Pima, Montezuma Castle, Navajo, Organ Pipe, Petrified Forest, Pipe Spring, Rainbow, Saguaro/Sunset Crater, Tonto, Tuzigoot, Walnut Canyon, Wupatki, Saguaro, Grand Canyon, Petrified Forest.

The History

Arizona was the scene of some of the last and fiercest fighting of the Indian wars. Born near the headwaters of Arizona’s Gila River in the mid 1820s, Goyathlay ('One Who Yawns') was a peaceful man who was transformed into a warrior when his family was massacred by Mexicans. During a charge against his enemies, frightened Mexicans began to scream 'Geronimo!' the name of their patron saint (Jerome, in English). Goyathlay’s men began calling him Geronimo.

Cochise also developed a hatred of Americans after they killed members of his family. Cochise, Geronimo, and Mangas Coloradas became three of the most famous Indian warriors.

While the Civil War was beginning far away to the east, they were attacking travelers and soldiers and raiding stagecoaches, ranches, and small settlements in the Southwest and Mexico. After an unsuccessful attack on an army column (the Battle of Apache Pass, July 15, 1862), they relied on small raiding parties and guerilla warfare.

Pursued by thousands of U.S. and Mexican soldiers, Cochise finally surrendered in 1872, Geronimo in 1886. The great Indian wars had finally ended.

Today, Arizona is home to one of the largest Indian populations in the U.S., with twenty reservations hosting more than fourteen tribes, including Navaho, Mohave, Apache, Hopi, Paiute, Papago, Pima, Maricopa, Yavapa, Hualapai, and Havasupai.

1st Europeans: Cabeza de Vaca was probably the first Spanish explorer to enter Arizona, about 1536. A Spanish Franciscan friar named Marcos de Niza entered the region in 1539. He was followed by Francisco Vásquez de Coronado in 1540, whose search for the mythical Seven Cities of Gold took him as far as the Grand Canyon.

The region was ruled by Spain until Mexico won its independence in 1821. Mexico then ruled it until 1848 (see below).

Acquired by U.S.: The territory north of the Gila River (including much of present New Mexico) was ceded to the U.S. in 1848, when the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo ended the Mexican War. It became part of the Territory of New Mexico in 1850. Later, the U.S. wanted to build a railroad through the area south of the Gila River and purchased the area between the river and the southern boundary of Arizona from Mexico in the Gadsden Purchase in 1853. Arizona was made a separate territory in 1863, and more lands were acquired through the Gadsden Purchase in 1853.

Arizona was organized as a territory on February 4, 1864. This region was sometimes called Arizona before 1863, although it was still in the Territory of New Mexico.

Arizona became the 48th state on February 14, 1912.

The People

The Hohokam were pit dwellers who constructed extensive irrigation systems A.D. 500-1450. Canyon de Chelly is among the most famous of ancient Southwest cliff dwellings. Many of these elaborate structures were built by the Pubelo, who flourished in Arizona between the 11th and 14th centuries. The Apache and Navaho arrived from Canada about 1300.

When the first Europeans arrived, the major tribes were the Apache (southeast Arizona), Papago (southwest Arizona), Mojave and Jualapai (Colorado River River in northern Arizona and California), and Navajo (mesa country of Arizona, New Mexico, and Colorado).

Spanish and Native American names are prominent.

The 2000 census put Arizona's population at 5,130,632. The State Capital is Phoenix, other major cities or towns include Tucson, Mesa, Glendale, Scottsdale, Tempe, Chandler, Peoria, Gilbert, Yuma.

USA

2009-06-09T23:18:00.000-07:00

PLACES OF UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

click on the states for more info..

CALIFORNIA

NEVADA

OREGON

WASHINGTON

NEWYORK

SOUTH CAROLINA

WYOMIN

TEXAS

ARIZONA

VERY SPECIAL PLACES ON EARTH

2009-06-09T23:16:00.004-07:00

click on the countries for their respective pics and info

USA

CALIFORNIA

2009-06-09T23:16:00.003-07:00

The Golden State, California takes its name from a make-believe island filled with gold in a Spanish novel.

California is located on the along the Pacific Coast and is bordered by Nevada on the east, Arizona (southeast), Mexico (south), Pacific Ocean (west), and Oregon (north).

At 158,648 square miles, California is the 3rd largest state. The highest elevation is Mt. Whitney in Inyo-Tulare County at 14,494 feet. The lowest elevation is Death Valley in Inyo County at -282 feet below sea level (lowest elevation in the United States).

Entertainment and Tourism. Hollywood has long been the world capital of motion-picture and television film production, in turn drawing numerous tourists. Other popular California tourist attractions include Disneyland, Sea World, the San Diego Zoo and other theme parks, San Francisco, Tijuana (just across the Mexican border from San Diego), and California's spectacular national parks and miles of beautiful beaches.

With mountains to the east and deserts to the south, California has the best of all worlds. You can Snow Ski in mountains then drive less then two hours and be in soaring high temperatures all in the same day.

The highest temperature recorded was 134° while the lowest was -45°.

National Parks & Monuments include Channel Islands, Death Valley, Joshua Tree, Kings Canyon, Lassen Volcanic, Mojave, Redwood, Sequoia, Yosemite, Cabrillo, Devil's Postpile, Lava Beds, Muir Woods, Pinnacles.

The History

Spain claimed and occupied California in the interest of increasing Spanish and Catholic influence. The Spanish colonization was highly authoritarian and subject to all the inefficiencies of centralized planning. To their credit, the Spanish envisioned the native population as playing an important role as Catholic citizens, but the mission/presidio system failed to adopt the Indians to this role and failed to attract a sufficient number of Spanish settlers.

When Mexico fought and obtained independence, California lost virtually all its centralized support. As members of an isolated community, Californians spent three decades in political confusion (at one point, a Californian-based republic was declared). The richest families turned to the one industry guaranteed to earn a comfortable living -- selling hides and tallow generated from the virtually free cattle that roamed vast ranchos. In an attempt to increase the non-Indian population, foreigners of all types were admitted.

Soon a sizable minority of Yankees grew, dominating the merchant class and entering into important positions in the political and social structure. The defense of California,
completely neglected by Mexico and lacking support from unstable California administrations, led to the unusual condition where any of several world powers could have easily occupied California. In point of fact, the Yankee residents themselves were the first to do it, in the Bear Flag revolt of June 1846. Just one month after, due to the Mexican-American war that in turn stemmed from the Yankee takeover of Texas, the American Navy took control of California without firing a shot.

Most Californians were resigned to inevitable Yankee rule, though a revolt at Los Angeles led to a pocket of Californian resistance lasting from September 1846 to January 1847. California was officially made a territory with the end of the Mexican-American war February 2, 1848, nine days before gold was discovered at Sutter's Mill.

Through some local PR efforts, and support in late 1848 from President Polk himself, a gold mania swept the States and the world resulting in the remarkable 49er migration. The population soared, quickly (and brutally) overwhelming the Californian and Indians. Political leaders seized the moment to obtain a constitution and voter's ratification by November 1849, with recognition by the U.S. congress in October 1850.

Meanwhile, the great influx of miners was redirected to farming, trade, and business. The beauty, richness, and climate of California -- as well as a lack of options for bankrupt miners -- kept the population here long after the gold mania died down. The State of California, a chaotic mix of ethnicity’s and incomes, hopes and cynicism, was born.

During World War II, U.S. citizens of Japanese descent were rounded up and confined in internment camps. Though the government claimed it was necessary for security reasons, the effort was driven largely by greed. While the Japanese Americans were locked up, their farms were sold to white farmers. Today, thousands of Mexicans contribute to the seasonal migrant labor hired to gather and pack crops.

The People

Not all Californian's have cement pools or are movie stars but with a State population that just exceeds the entire population of Canada, California has the largest percentage of millionaires in the U.S.

More immigrants settle in California than any other state, more than one third of the nation's total in 1994. The most numerous group of immigrants are Asians and Pacific Islanders, though many Mexicans emigrate to California, either legally or by illegally crossing the border between California and Texas. Whites remain the largest ethnic group but, for the first time, no longer constitute the majority. Hispanics make up one third of the population in California, which also saw a boom in Asian immigration.

The 2000 census put California's population at 33,871,648. The State Capital is Sacramento, other major cities or towns include Los Angeles, San Diego, San Jose, San Francisco, Long Beach, Fresno, Oakland, Santa Ana, Anaheim.

NEVADA

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The Land

The Sage State, Sagebrush State, Casino, Nevada is named for Sierra Nevada range; in Spanish, Nevada means "snow," or "snowy," while sierra means "mountains".

Nevada is located almost entirely within the Great Basin portion of the Inter-Mountain region (between Rocky Mountains and Sierra Nevada) and is bordered by Oregon & Idaho (north), Utah (east), Arizona (southeast), California (west & southwest).

At 110,567 square mile, Nevada is the 7th largest state. The highest elevation is Boundary Peak on Nevada-California border south of Hawthorne at 13,145 feet. The lowest elevation is Colorado River in Clark County at 479 feet.

Nevada is the driest state, with an overall average annual rainfall of only about 7 inches. The wettest part of Nevada receives about 40 inches a year, while the driest averages less than 4 inches. Summer temperatures are hottest in parts of southern Nevada, while winters can be extremely cold in western and northern Nevada.

With mostly mountainous and desert terrain, altitudes vary from 1,000 feet to over 13,000 feet. Climate is arid, abundant sunshine; light rainfall; snow. Average temperature varies from 70 degrees Fahrenheit in south to 45 degrees Fahrenheit in north.

The highest temperature recorded was 125° while the lowest was -50°

National Parks & Monuments include Great Basin National Park.

The History

There were many Spanish explorers in the 1770s who came near the Nevada area, but it wasn't until 50 years later that fur traders venturing into the Rocky Mts. publicized the region.

Nevada's first settlement was Genoa, near Carson City, settled by Mormons in 1849, then called Mormon Station.

Nevada's name was adopted in 1861 when territory was established. The name was derived from the Spanish language, meaning "snow-capped".

Nevada was admitted as part of Utah Territory in 1854 and then as the Territory of Nevada on March 2, 1861.

On October 31, 1864 the territory was then admitted as the State of Nevada. This date is now celebrated as a state holiday.

Nevada was made famous by the discovery of the fabulous Comstock Lode in 1859 and its mines have produced large quantities of gold, silver, copper, lead, zinc, mercury, barite, and tungsten. Oil was discovered in 1954. Gold now far exceeds all other minerals in value of production.

Today, Tourism is Nevada’s most important source of revenue. Many people are attracted by gambling, which was legalized in 1931, helping make Nevada the nation’s gambling and entertainment capital. Nevada now ranks 4th among the states in total gambling revenue, but is first in the amount per resident. Many people have visited Nevada in order to get divorced, another industry born in 1931. Reno and Las Vegas gained fame as the 'divorce capitals of the nation', though more liberal laws in other states have had an impact. But many tourists flock to resorts in Las Vegas, Reno, and Lake Tahoe, along with various other attractions.

Nevada became the 36th state to Unite under America on October 31st, 1864.

The People

Whites comprised the largest share of the population, 75.2 percent, in 2000, while blacks were 6.8 percent of the people, Asians 4.5 percent, Native Americans 1.3 percent, Native Hawaiians and other Pacific Islanders 0.4 percent, and those of mixed heritage or not reporting ethnicity 11.8 percent. Hispanics, who may be of any race, were 19.7 percent of the people. Many Native Americans live on reservations, which are scattered widely over the state. Some Native Americans own individually allotted grazing lands.

The 2000 census put Nevada's population at 1,998,257 Nevada has since experience a major population boom. The State Capital is Carson City, other major cities or towns include Las Vegas, Reno, Henderson, North Las Vegas, Sparks, Elko, Boulder City and Winnemucca.

OREGON

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The Land

The Beaver State, Webfoot State, Oregon's name is a mystery. Several possible theories enclude: (1) The French Canadian word ouragan, meaning "storm" or "hurricane". (2) The Spanish word orejon or "big-ear," a term applied to local Indian tribes. (3) It's a modification of the Spanish word orégano, for the wild sage that grows in eastern region (4) Possiblily taken from writings of an English army officer, Maj. Robert Rogers.

Oregon is located on the Pacific Northwest and is bordered by Washington on the north, Idaho (east), Nevada & California (south), and the Pacific Ocean (west).

At 97,052 square miles, Oregon is the 10th largest state.

The highest elevation is Mt. Hood in Clackamas-Hood River counties at 11,239 feet while the lowest elevation is the Pacific Ocean at sea level.

The highest temperature recorded was 119° while the lowest was -54°

National Parks & Monuments include Crater Lake, John Day Fossil Beds, Oregon Caves, Newberry.

The History

Spanish and English sailors are believed to have sighted the Oregon coast in the 1500s and 1600s. Capt. James Cook, seeking the Northwest Passage, charted some of the coastline in 1778. In 1792, Capt. Robert Gray, in the Columbia, discovered the river named after his ship and claimed the area for the U.S.

In 1805 the Lewis and Clark expedition explored the area. John Jacob Astor's fur depot, Astoria, was founded in 1811. Disputes for control of Oregon between American settlers and the Hudson Bay Company were finally resolved in the 1846 Oregon Treaty, in which Great Britain gave up claims to the region.

Oregon's nickname, the Beaver State, harks back to the early years of the 19th century.
Fur hats were fashionable at that time, in northeastern cities, and Oregon's streams were an important source of beaver. With competition fierce among the fur companies for control of the western lands, adventurous trappers, called mountain men, became the first white people to know the region well. Later, when the rage for beaver hats had passed and Oregon's beaver supply was all but exhausted, the mountain men showed the early pioneers a route they had picked out in their trapping years. Known as the Oregon Trail, it took thousands during the 1840s to the fertile Willamette Valley, where wheat, fruits, and vegetables thrived. Settlers were also drawn to other parts of the state, where a profitable timber industry later developed around Oregon's bountiful supply of Douglas fir trees.

Oregon became the 33rd State to Unite under America on February 14, 1859.

The People

Whites make up 86.6 percent of the population while Asians are 3 percent percent. Blacks, most of whom live in Portland, account for 1.6 percent of the state's population. Native Americans, many of whom live in or near the Warm Springs, Umatilla, Siletz, and former Klamath reservations, constitute 1.3 percent of the population; Native Hawaiians and other Pacific Islanders are 0.2 percent; and those of mixed heritage or not reporting ethnicity are 7.3 percent. Hispanics, who may be of any race, are 8 percent of the people.

The 1998 census put Oregon's population at 3,282,000. The State Capital is Salem, other major cities or towns include Portland, Eugene, Gresham, Beaverton, Hillsboro, Medford, Springfield, Bend and Corvallis.

WASHINGTON

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The Evergreen State, Washington was named by for President George Washington by an eastern politician.

Washington is located in the North-West and is bordered by British Columbia on the north, Idaho (east), Oregon (south), and Pacific Ocean (west).

At 68,126 square miles, Washington is the 20th largest state. The highest Elevation is Mt. Rainier in West Pierce County at 14,410 feet while the lowest elevation is the Pacific Ocean at sea level.

The Pacific Ocean moderates Western Washington's climate, which is generally mild, with rainy winters and little snow in the lowlands. Eastern Washington gets much hotter in summer and colder in winter.

The highest temperature recorded was 118° while the lowest was -48°

National Parks & Monuments include Mount Rainier, North Cascades, Olympic, Mount St Helens.

The History

Two of the most important elements encouraging European exploration of the Northwest were competition between European nations and the search for the Northwest Passage, an inland water route linking the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans. The Spanish and the English were the first to venture up the northwest coast of the Pacific Ocean.

Spain, which had become the wealthiest European nation during the 16th century, saw its wealth decline during the 17th century. Spaniards hoped to reestablish themselves through exploration of the Northwest. In 1775 Spaniards Bruno Heceta and Juan de la Bodega y Quadra sent an expedition to near present-day Point Grenville and claimed the land in the name of the king of Spain. In 1778 British explorer Captain James Cook charted the Washington coast and went ashore on Vancouver Island at Nootka Sound. Since both the British and Spanish claimed land in the area, relations between the two countries became tense. In order to avoid a war, they agreed to respect each other's commercial activities and settlements in the region.

In 1792 Captain George Vancouver of Britain became the first European to complete a detailed survey of the Washington coast and the inland waters. Vancouver named many Washington landmarks, including Mount Rainier, Mount Baker, and many of the San Juan Islands. Vancouver named Puget Sound after the officer who first sighted it, Peter Puget.

Also in 1792, as Vancouver charted the Washington coast and inland waters, American captain Robert Gray, a fur trader from Boston, explored the mouth of the Columbia River. He named the river after his ship. Both Britain and the United States had claims on Washington territory.

After the United States acquired the Louisiana Territory from France in 1803, President Thomas Jefferson commissioned explorers Meriwether Lewis and William Clark to explore the West (see Lewis and Clark Expedition). The two explorers, instructed to take special note of the geography and vegetation of the West, traveled down the Columbia River and reached the Pacific Coast in 1805.

Washington Territory was carved out of Oregon Territory in 1853.

Washington became the 42nd State to Unite under America on November 11, 1889.

The People

Whites constitute 81.8 percent of the population. The largest nonwhite group are Asians, who represent 5.5 percent of the people. Blacks are 3.2 percent, Native Americans 1.6 percent, Native Hawaiians and other Pacific Islanders 0.4 percent, and those of mixed heritage or who didn't report ethnicity 7.5 percent. Hispanics, who can be of any race, are 7.5 percent of the people. Washington contains more than 20 Native American reservations, including one of the largest in the country, belonging to the Yakama peoples. Other Native American groups are the Pend d'Oreille (Kalispel), Spokane, and Makah.

The 1998 census put Washington's population at 5,689,000. The State Capital is Olympia, other major cities or towns include Bellevue, Bellingham, Olympia, Seattle, Spokane and Tacoma.

NEWYORK

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The Land

Empire State, Excelsior, Knickerbocker, New York was named in honor of the brother of England's King Charles II, the Duke of York and Albany.

New York is located in the Northeastern United States, between the New England States and the Great Lakes and is bordered by Vermont, Massachusetts, Connecticut & the Atlantic Ocean on the east, New Jersey & Pennsylvania (south), Lake Erie & Ontario and the Canadian province of Ontario (northwest), and the province of Quebec (north).

At 49,112 square miles, New York is the 30th biggest state. The highest elevaton is Mt. Marcy in Essex County at 5,344 feet while the lowest elevation is the Atlantic Ocean at sea level.

The climate of New York is generally humid. Variations in terrain, elevation, and exposure to bodies of water cause variations in climate. The coastal area has higher temperatures, less frost, less cloudiness, and fewer storms. Upstate lowlands are subject to considerable extremes in temperature, especially during winter when cold air from Canada and the interior invade the state. In summer, warm moist air from the Gulf of Mexico and southeastern United States may bring rains, although cloudless skies generally prevail.

The highest teperature recorded was 108° while the lowest was -52°.

The History

The 1st Europeans was Giovanni da Verrazano (an Italian-born navigator sailing for France) who entered New York Bay in 1524. Henry Hudson (an Englishman employed by the Dutch) reached the bay and sailed up the Hudson River in 1609. Samuel de Champlain explored and claimed northern New York for France in 1609.

In 1624 the first permanent Dutch settlement was established at Fort Orange (now Albany); one year later Peter Minuit is said to have purchased Manhattan Island from the Indians for trinkets worth about $24 and founded the Dutch colony of New Amsterdam (now New York City), which was surrendered to the English in 1664.

For a short time, New York City was the U.S. capital, and George Washington was inaugurated there as the first president on April 30, 1789.

New York City has been the most ethnically diverse city in the world since the 1640s, when fewer than 1,000 total residents spoke more than 15 languages. Between 1880 and 1919, more than 23 million Europeans immigrated to the United States. At least 17 million of them disembarked in New York. No one knows how many remained there, but as early as 1880, more than half the city's working population was foreign-born, providing New York with the largest immigrant labor force on earth.

New York became the 11th State to Unite under America on July 26.

The People

In 1990 nearly 16 percent of the state's total population had been born abroad, and many of them resided in New York City. Whites constituted 67.9 percent of the population in 2000, blacks 15.9 percent, Asians 5.5 percent, and Native Americans 0.4 percent. Native Hawaiians and other Pacific Islanders numbered 8,818. Those of mixed heritage or not reporting ethnicity were 10.2 percent. Hispanics, who may be of any race, were 15.1 percent of the people.

By the late 1990s, more than 120 languages were spoken in New York city's schools, and there were dozens of ethnic churches, political organizations, cultural festivals, and parades, as well as scores of foreign-language newspapers, magazines, and television and radio stations. Although rivalries among the various groups could be intense, the very diversity of the city permitted immigrants to mingle more easily than in most other parts of the nation.

The 1998 census put New York's population at 18,175,000. The State Capital is Albany, other major cities or towns include New York, Buffalo, Rochester, Yonkers, Syracuse, New Rochelle, Mount Vernon, Schenectady and Utica.

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