Byron Scott

latest news about, Byron Scott was fired last May instead of today, I would probably be in a better financial position, as Scott would have been requested by at least a few teams, Sacramento and Minnesota, among them. As it is, Scott has signed a contract for the 2010-11 season … and has few decent concert.

It’s not Sacramento or Minnesota are glamorous jobs, but they were rebuilding the team with low expectations, as the Hornets were when Scott came to New Orleans. This summer? I imagine the work will be available networks, but the bridge has been out of the ashes of the ages. The Pacers and Grizzlies are the other most likely openings, except surprise retirement Jerry Sloan, Don Nelson and Larry Brown.

But there’s a Scott’s work has always been linked to that might also be available and becomes quite luxurious: the one currently occupied by Phil Jackson.

That work now enters the scene Lakers as the best prospect of Scott at this time. A year ago, Scott told the Los Angeles Times, says the organization of the Lakers in the utmost regard, and plans to head to the selection “often”. While Jackson appeared at the same time the groom’s house assistants Kurt Rambis and Brian Shaw, Scott would certainly be a first class candidate from outside, if Phil will retire.

And now, one obstacle has been reduced: Scott does not have another great option, not a paid job. Jackson is in the way of Sloan, to judge whether it can handle another day of grinding on the fly. He paid $ 12 million this season, and has spoken to wrap his career. After winning his 10th title – and passing Red Auerbach on the list of championship coaches – seem to offer some kind of long to stay.

Of course, Rambis thought enough of the continual passion or Jackson for training or the love of the Shaw organization (or some combination thereof) to take their chances in Minneapolis. I suppose in the next nine months we will see how that fits into the equation Scott, and whether Shaw should be the next head coaching job that has offered.
Source: nba.fanhouse.com

United Commercial Bank

United Commercial Bank : overthrown by loan losses and misrepresented financial reports, Kingdom of San Francisco, the Commercial Bank was closed by regulators late Friday and immediately sold east of Pasadena West Bancorp, creating by far the largest U.S. bank focused on the Chinese American market.

The combination also will be the largest bank headquartered in Southern California, surpassing National City Bancorp

East West agreed to assume all deposits commercial unit, so that depositors will lose money, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. said. 63 bank branches in the U.S. including Southern California 17in, will reopen Saturday as branches of East West Bank.

United Commercial, a unit of UCBH Holdings Inc., was the fourth largest bank to fail this year. That position was previously occupied by the National Bank of California, Los Angeles, which failed last week and was acquired by U.S. Bancorp of Minneapolis.

Regulators also arrested on Friday from a bank each in Georgia, Michigan, Minnesota and Missouri, bringing to 120 the number of failures this year.

United Commercial Bank United Commercial collapse may cause a greater stir than usual because a year ago the federal government invested $ 299 million in bailout funds in the bank in exchange for preferred stock that became worthless failure.

In addition, the FDIC said the collapse would cost the federal insurance fund an estimated deposit of $ 1.4 billion.

East West raised $ 500 million in new capital to support the takeover, the majority of investment funds and other existing shareholders, said Dominic Ng, chairman of the lender based in Pasadena.

The sale of shares in private placement will allow East West to proceed slowly because it integrates the two banks, then have a bunch of years later near the capital consider further expansion by adding more branches or make acquisitions.

The acquisition will greatly expand the scope of West Timor, which has been concentrated in southern California and the Bay of San Francisco. In addition to the 69 offices in California, East West has a full-service branches in Houston and Hong Kong.

Business Unit not only has dozens of branches in California, but also has locations in major areas of China from America, including New York, Boston, Seattle, Atlanta and Houston.

Moreover, because of its 2007 acquisition of a Shanghai bank, United also has a commercial banking license in China – a “rare and hard to come by” asset that makes it easier to operate and expand in that country, said Joe Morford at RBC Capital Markets. It has full service offices in Shanghai, Hong Kong and Shantou, China.

United Commercial, East West Bancorp and Cathay General of Los Angeles for years have competed to become the largest central banks in the Chinese American market.

East West, with $ 12.5 billion in assets in the last report, agreed to buy 10.2 billion U.S. dollars of the United Commercial 11.2 billion U.S. dollars in assets. That would put the merged bank, to nearly $ 23 billion in assets, ahead of LA-based National City as the largest bank basedin Southern California. In the last report, National City had $ 18.4 billion in assets.

The FDIC agreed to absorb the majority of expected losses at about 7.7 billion U.S. dollars of business assets acquired were joined by East West.

Like their Chinese rivals American, United Commercial was burned by losses on commercial loans, especially loans to developers and builders during the housing boom. But it was marred by financial scandal that resulted in a reorganization of its senior management.

Southwest Airlines

Latest News Updated, Southwest Airlines: If you missed the Southwest Airlines sale earlier this month, don’t fret. Now there’s an airfare sale with even lower fares. Southwest’s 4th Quarter Sale is football-themed and offers fares as low as $25 one way for flights up to 374 miles.
There is an escalating price structure that gives $50 seats for flights between 375 and 549 miles; $75 fares for flights between 550-900 miles and $100 one-way fares for flights of 1,000 miles or more. But make your plans quickly because this sale will only last 72 hours. Note that some pricing differs if you are flying out of Los Angeles (LAX) vs. Burbank (BUR).

Caveat: You may experience delays in accessing this deal.  Southwest’s website was loading slowly at one point this morning. A note there said: “The popularity of our 72-hour fare sale is generating a lot of interest in southwest.com. The web experience might be slower than usual. Thanks for your patience.”

Sample destinations:
Fares are each way, pre tax; not all sale destinations included

$25 — Burbank (BUR) to: Oakland (OAK), Sacramento (SAC), Reno/Tahoe (RNO), San Jose (SJC) or Los Angeles (LAX) to: Las Vegas (LAS), San Francisco (SFO), Phoenix (PHX), San Jose (SJC), Oakland (OAK), Sacramento (SAC)

$50 — Burbank (BUR) or Los Angeles (LAX) to: Tucson (TUS); Los Angeles (LAX) to: Reno/Tahoe (RNO) or Denver (DEN)

$75 — Burbank (BUR) to: Albuquerque (ABQ), Portland (PDX), Salt Lake City, Seattle (SEA) Spokane (GEG); Los Angeles (LAX) to: Amarillo (AMA), El Paso (ELP), Boise (BOI), Albuquerque (ABQ), Portland (PDX), Salt Lake City, Seattle (SEA), Spokane (GEG)

$100 — Burbank (BUR) to: Birmingham (BHM), Austin (AUS), Minneapolis/St Paul (MSP), Little Rock (LIT), Oklahoma City (OKC), San Antonio (SAT); Los Angeles (LAX) to: Baltimore (BWI), Chicago (MDW), Houston (HOU), Kansas City (MCI), Milwaukee (MKE) , New Orleans (MSY), Omaha (OMA), Nashville (BNA)

When: Book by Oct. 29, 2009, 11:59 p.m. Pacific Standard Time for travel Dec. 2-Dec. 16, 2009 and Jan. 5-Feb. 10, 2010.
Source: travel.latimes.com

Off-Course Pilots Cite Computer Distraction

Two pilots who flew past the Minneapolis-St. Paul airport told investigators that they were distracted by a discussion of a new crew-scheduling system.

See the original post here:
Off-Course Pilots Cite Computer Distraction

100,000 women say they’re offended by Berlusconi (AP)

AP – More than 100,000 women have signed a petition saying they are offended by Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi — an initiative launched by a newspaper after the premier made a sexist remark to an opposition politician.

Go here to see the original:
100,000 women say they’re offended by Berlusconi (AP)

How the Media Treat Murder

Why isn’t the story of several missing women in North Carolina getting attention?

Original post:
How the Media Treat Murder

Dollar gains slightly, circles euro at $1.50 (AP)

The dollar pushed back slightly Thursday, but the euro continued to hover around $1.50 as corporate results and economic data sent investors mixed signals on the U.S. economy, and some worried China might cut down on stimulus measures.

Read the original post:
Dollar gains slightly, circles euro at $1.50 (AP)

Airline crew overshot Minn. airport by 150 miles (AP)

AP – Two Northwest Airlines pilots failed to make radio contact with ground controllers for more than an hour and overflew their Minneapolis destination by 150 miles before discovering the mistake and turning around.

Read the rest here:
Airline crew overshot Minn. airport by 150 miles (AP)

Cabelas, Cabelas

Cabelas sporting goods store was founded in 1967 and has since become the largest retail, mail-order and internet outfitting facility in the world. It all started with a simple plan. Dick Cabela created a plan for selling fishing flies he bought while in Chicago and when he returned home he placed an ad in the paper that read “12 hand-tied flies for $1″. One person responded. Undiscouraged, Dick reformulated his plan and placed a new ad that read “FREE Introductory offer! 5 hand tied Flies….. 25c Postage…… Handling” and submitted it to several national outdoor geared magazines. The offer was snatched up by people around the world and history was written.

Over the years the business kept growing and had to be moved to larger and larger locations. Today more then 120 million catalogs are sent out through the mail each year and the orders keep coming in at the Cabelas sporting goods store. Cabelas MN has numerous retail stores with showrooms stocked to the brim for a superior shopping experience. Cabelas Outdoor Adventures was officially established in 1985 and has become the world’s leading fishing and hunting consulting agency employing hundreds of outdoor experts. Cabelas fishing trips can be arranged through Cabelas for some of the best organized trips out there.

The Cabelas MN range of catalogs offer a huge wealth of information for outdoor sports and events imaginable. Some even call it the “Outdoor Bible”. Camping, fishing, hunting and boating supplies are sold through their retail stores and complete catalogs. Buyers’ guides, field test reports, comparison charts and gear lists are all available through Cabelas MN. Loyal customers love all the expert advice offered and many consult the professional lists before investing in outdoor gear.

Cabelas Outdoor Adventures teams up with leading outfitting organizations around the world to offer some of the best hunting, camping, canoeing, fishing, and kayaking adventures around. Cabelas fishing trips can be researched o through their catalogs where a host of detailed information can be found. There are contact numbers available so you can talk in length to an expert about Cabelas fishing trips and exactly what’s included in the different packages.

If you’re an outdoors enthusiast you’ll love all the Cabelas MN products. All the most up-to-date gear can be purchased from the Cabelas sporting goods store and you can learn a lot about a variety of outdoor sports through their articles and expert advice. Advice on specific things to do when executing an outdoor sport comes in handy for beginners’.

There are three Cabelas sporting goods stores in Minnesota. The one in Minneapolis utilizes 40-acres of the 55-acre site and features a 185,000 square foot showroom complete with museum-style exhibits, trophy animals, massive aquariums and natural habitat recreation. It’s much more then a regular retail store! Two other stores include one in East Grand Forks northwest of Bemidji and one in Owatonna, Minnesota west of Rochester and south of St Paul. Total stores in the USA are more then thirty.

From meager beginnings as a small catalog business to growth into a multi-million dollar corporation, Cabelas Outdoor Adventures always have their priorities straight, their customers. It’s with exemplary customer service that Cabelas has made it this far. The variety of goods offered is unsurpassed by any other outfitting store in the nation.

With 76 catalogs published each year you’ll always find what you’re looking for. The number of resources Cabelas offers for their clients makes them a very valuable source, not only for goods, but also for the latest information. When you’re looking for high quality, affordable outdoor equipment you won’t have to look farther then a Cabelas sporting goods store.
Source: destination360.com

Smallest State Capital

I think it was James Kushner who first suggested that I consider the question of which U.S. state capital had the smallest population in relation to its state’s largest city. For example, New York City is the largest city in the United States, but the state capital of New York State is Albany, with a population of about 850,000. The population of New York City exceeds that of Albany by a factor of around 20.

At the other end of the scale, of course, we have state capitals like Boston, Denver, Atlanta, and Honolulu that are their state’s largest cities. For these states, the population quotient is 1, its theoretical minimum.

Well, James, it only took me thirty years, but here it is.

I tried to resolve the question manually a few weeks ago, by browsing Wikipedia for the populations of likely candidates. Today I took a more methodical approach, downloading the U.S. Census Bureau’s July 2006 estimates for populations of metropolitan areas, and writing a couple of little programs to grovel the data.

I had to augment the Census Bureau’s data with two items: Annapolis, MD, and Montpelier, VT are not large enough to be included in the metropolitan area data file. I used U.S. Census 2006 estimates for these cities as well.

I discarded one conurbation: the Census Bureau includes a “Metropolitan Division” in New Hampshire that consists of Rockingham and Strafford counties; this was the most populous identified area in New Hampshire. It didn’t seem entirely germane to the question, so I took it out. On the other hand, including it doesn’t change the results much: its population is 416,000, compared with Manchester-Nashua’s 402,000.

State	Capital and its Population		Largest metropolitan area and its population		Quotient
MD	Annapolis	36,408	Baltimore-Towson	2,658,405	73	.02
IL	Springfield	206,112	Chicago-Naperville-Joliet	9,505,748	46	.12
NV	Carson City	55,289	Las Vegas-Paradise	1,777,539	32	.15
VT	Montpelier	7,954	Burlington-South Burlington	206,007	25	.90
NY	Albany	850,957	New York-Northern New Jersey-Long Island	18,818,536	22	.11
MO	Jefferson City	144,958	St. Louis	2,796,368	19	.29
KY	Frankfort	69,068	Louisville-Jefferson County	1,222,216	17	.70
FL	Tallahassee	336,502	Miami-Fort Lauderdale-Miami Beach	5,463,857	16	.24
WA	Olympia	234,670	Seattle-Tacoma-Bellevue	3,263,497	13	.91
AK	Juneau	30,737	Anchorage	359,180	11	.69
PA	Harrisburg	525,380	Philadelphia-Camden-Wilmington	5,826,742	11	.09
SD	Pierre	19,761	Sioux Falls	212,911	10	.77
MI	Lansing	454,044	Detroit-Warren-Livonia	4,468,966	9	.84
NJ	Trenton	367,605	Edison	2,308,777	6	.28
CA	Sacramento	2,067,117	Los Angeles-Long Beach-Santa Ana	12,950,129	6	.26
NM	Santa Fe	142,407	Albuquerque	816,811	5	.74
OR	Salem	384,600	Portland-Vancouver-Beaverton	2,137,565	5	.56
DE	Dover	147,601	Wilmington	691,688	4	.69
VA	Richmond	1,194,008	Washington-Arlington-Alexandria	5,290,400	4	.43
ME	Augusta	121,068	Portland-South Portland-Biddeford	513,667	4	.24
TX	Austin	1,513,565	Dallas-Fort Worth-Arlington	6,003,967	3	.97
AL	Montgomery	361,748	Birmingham-Hoover	1,100,019	3	.04
NE	Lincoln	283,970	Omaha-Council Bluffs	822,549	2	.90
WI	Madison	543,022	Milwaukee-Waukesha-West Allis	1,509,981	2	.78
NH	Concord	148,085	Manchester-Nashua	402,789	2	.72
KS	Topeka	228,894	Wichita	592,126	2	.59
MT	Helena	70,558	Billings	148,116	2	.10
ND	Bismarck	101,138	Fargo	187,001	1	.85
NC	Raleigh	994,551	Charlotte-Gastonia-Concord	1,583,016	1	.59
LA	Baton Rouge	766,514	New Orleans-Metairie-Kenner	1,024,678	1	.34
OH	Columbus	1,725,570	Cleveland-Elyria-Mentor	2,114,155	1	.23
AR	Little Rock	652,834	Little Rock-North Little Rock	652,834	1	.00
AZ	Phoenix	4,039,182	Phoenix-Mesa-Scottsdale	4,039,182	1	.00
CO	Denver	2,408,750	Denver-Aurora	2,408,750	1	.00
CT	Hartford	1,188,841	Hartford-West Hartford-East Hartford	1,188,841	1	.00
GA	Atlanta	5,138,223	Atlanta-Sandy Springs-Marietta	5,138,223	1	.00
HI	Honolulu	909,863	Honolulu	909,863	1	.00
IA	Des Moines	534,230	Des Moines-West Des Moines	534,230	1	.00
ID	Boise	567,640	Boise City-Nampa	567,640	1	.00
IN	Indianapolis	1,666,032	Indianapolis-Carmel	1,666,032	1	.00
MA	Boston	4,455,217	Boston-Cambridge-Quincy	4,455,217	1	.00
MN	St. Paul	3,175,041	Minneapolis-St. Paul-Bloomington	3,175,041	1	.00
MS	Jackson	529,456	Jackson	529,456	1	.00
OK	Oklahoma City	1,172,339	Oklahoma City	1,172,339	1	.00
RI	Providence	1,612,989	Providence-New Bedford-Fall River	1,612,989	1	.00
SC	Columbia	703,771	Columbia	703,771	1	.00
TN	Nashville	1,455,097	Nashville-Davidson–Murfreesboro	1,455,097	1	.00
UT	Salt Lake City	1,067,722	Salt Lake City	1,067,722	1	.00
WV	Charleston	305,526	Charleston	305,526	1	.00
WY	Cheyenne	85,384	Cheyenne	85,384	1	.00

Nineteen of fifty state capitals are their state’s largest cities.

Vermont is an interesting outlier here. It makes fourth place not because it
has a large city, but because its capital, Montpelier, is so very small.
I tried doing some scatter plots, to see if anything else jumped out, but they
weren’t very illuminating. If anything, the data is suprisingly evenly

distributed. Here’s an example:
Source: blog.plover.com

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