VOL. 37 | NO. 47 | Friday, November 22, 2013
Regular listeners to WPLN, Nashville’s public radio station, have been hearing local newsman Blake Farmer’s stories increasingly broadcast on National Public Radio network shows.
While visiting Nashville for a John Prine and Steve Earle concert at the Ryman Auditorium, Minnesota residents Gene and Maureen Greden found themselves shopping for fine leather goods at the Idea Hatchery, an enclave of East Nashville shops in spaces no larger than the average suburban dining room.
Picture this: Your laptop screen is a framed picture of a dragon, like in a museum. You take your smart phone, switch it to camera and look at the laptop. All of a sudden, the dragon leans out of the frame, looks up, down and all around.
Sarah Short, 18, had carefully planned her college future – and, then the U.S. Army threw her a curve.
REALTY CHECK
CNN is running a documentary this week titled the “The Assassination of President Kennedy.” Having been a conspiracy buff since reading Mark Lane’s Rush to Judgment in 1979, I have watched the show twice and finally, after 34 years, have concluded that Oswald was the lone assassin. The chase was fun.
REAL ESTATE
Top October 2013 commercial real estate transactions for Davidson, Williamson, Rutherford, Wilson and Sumner counties, as compiled by Chandler Reports.
TERRY McCORMICK
Somewhere Pete Rozelle is smiling, knowing his vision for the NFL is being realized.
NEWSMAKERS
Woodmont Investment Counsel, LLC has hired Robert Perry as vice president.
The Rotary Club of Nashville, Tennessee’s oldest and largest civic organization, commemorated the 100th anniversary of its first Club meeting this week at the Wildhorse Saloon.
BUSINESS BOOK REVIEW
Your mother worked for as long as you can remember.
GUERRILLA MARKETING
December is crunch time for retailers and B2B companies reliant on crucial holiday sales to hit annual sales targets. In fact, Google reports that 70 percent of consumers wait to make holiday purchases until after Thanksgiving, with the majority conducting at least some of that shopping online.
I SWEAR
One of my favorite quotes is from a Shakespearean play: “The first thing we do, let’s kill all the lawyers.” It gets me hot and bothered when people abuse and/or misuse this nugget of literature.
KAY'S COOKING CORNER
Last week, Don and I attended an American Court and Commercial Newspaper Conference (ACCN) in Baltimore. We stayed downtown, across the street from the Chesapeake Bay, and had a beautiful view from our room of the USS Constellation, which is now a permanently docked museum.
HEALTH CARE
WASHINGTON (AP) — White House chief of staff Denis McDonough was ready to vent.
NATIONAL BUSINESS
A federal bankruptcy judge has cleared the way for American Airlines and US Airways to close their merger and create the world's largest airline.
WASHINGTON (AP) — A measure of the U.S. economy's health increased in October, suggesting consumers and businesses mostly shrugged off the 16-day partial government shutdown.
WASHINGTON (AP) — The number of Americans seeking unemployment benefits dropped 10,000 last week to a seasonally adjusted 316,000, a sign that workers are in less danger of being laid off.
WASHINGTON (AP) — Businesses spent less last month on machinery, computers and most other items, lowering orders for U.S. long-lasting factory goods. The decline suggests companies may have been reluctant to invest during the 16-day partial government shutdown
WASHINGTON (AP) — No one begs Santa Claus for cheaper gasoline. Yet falling gas prices are shaping up as an unexpected gift for drivers — and for people on their holiday shopping lists.
NEW YORK (AP) — The stock market edged higher after encouraging news about the economy Wednesday.
BANGKOK (AP) — Oil wallowed near $93 a barrel Wednesday as energy markets waited for a U.S. report on crude supplies.
TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 26
STATEWIDE
NASHVILLE (AP) — State officials are giving Tennessee residents an online option to access driving records.
STATE LEGISLATURE
HELENA, Mont. (AP) — Gun advocates asked the U.S. Supreme Court on Monday to overturn a lower court's ruling against state laws designed to buck federal gun rules.
HEALTH CARE
NASHVILLE (AP) - A lawsuit filed by the Catholic Diocese of Nashville says the new federal health care law requires it to violate its religious principals by offering contraceptive services to employees.
WASHINGTON (AP) — The Supreme Court agreed Tuesday to referee another dispute over President Barack Obama's health care law, whether businesses can use religious objections to escape a requirement to cover birth control for employees.
NATIONAL BUSINESS
NEW YORK (AP) — Upbeat news from the housing industry and luxury retailer Tiffany & Co. nudged the stock market higher Tuesday.
NEW YORK (AP) — The price of oil fell Tuesday as traders wait to see if the government reports a 10th straight weekly increase in U.S. crude oil supplies.
WASHINGTON (AP) — U.S. banks earned less in the July-September quarter than they did a year earlier, marking their first year-over-year profit decline since the spring of 2009 when the country was still mired in the Great Recession.
WASHINGTON (AP) — U.S. developers received approval in October to build apartments at the fastest pace in five years, a trend that could boost economic growth in the final three months of the year.
WASHINGTON (AP) — U.S. home prices rose more slowly in September than in August, a sign that weaker sales are preventing the kinds of sharp price gains that occurred earlier this year.
NEW YORK (AP) — Never say never. Just when it looked like a potential combination of Men's Wearhouse and Jos. A. Bank was dead in the water, the script has been flipped.
GENEVA (AP) — The director-general of the World Trade Organization says negotiators have failed to craft the first global trade deal in more than a decade, which could have given the world economy a $1 trillion boost.
NATIONAL POLITICS
WASHINGTON (AP) — Pushing back hard, President Barack Obama forcefully defended the temporary agreement to freeze Iran's disputed nuclear program on Monday, declaring that the United States "cannot close the door on diplomacy."
MONDAY, NOVEMBER 25
MUSIC INDUSTRY
NASHVILLE (AP) - Billboard is updating its Christian and gospel song charts, continuing a modernization process intended to reflect the use of the Internet on listening habits.
STATEWIDE
NASHVILLE (AP) - The Tennessee Transportation Department commissioner said Monday that the state won't be able to start any new highway projects if it loses federal funding next year.
LITTLE ROCK, Ark. (AP) — A federal judge in Arkansas approved a settlement Monday that pays $84.9 million to 5,500 trucking companies who were cheated out of promised rebates by Pilot Flying J, the nation's largest diesel retailer.
AUTO INDUSTRY
FLORENCE, Italy (AP) — Chrysler won't be offering its stock for sale on the public markets this year.
NATIONAL BUSINESS
WASHINGTON (AP) — The number of Americans who signed contracts to buy homes fell in October for the fifth straight month. Higher mortgage rates, price increases and the 16-day partial government shutdown held back sales.
BENTONVILLE, Ark. (AP) — Wal-Mart Stores CEO and President Mike Duke plans to step down Feb. 1. The company says Doug McMillon, head of international operations, will succeed him.
TORONTO (AP) — BlackBerry's interim chief executive has shaken up BlackBerry's management team in a move seen as prelude to him taking the top job himself.
NEW YORK (AP) — The stock market paused Monday, ending on a mixed note, after a string of records in recent weeks.
The price of oil dropped to near $94 a barrel Monday as a deal between Iran and six world powers on the country's nuclear program raised the possibility that sanctions choking Iranian oil exports will be lifted.
NEW YORK (AP) — This holiday season, Americans may not spend their green unless they see more red.
NATIONAL POLITICS
WASHINGTON (AP) — For 51 years of war and peace, Republicans and Democrats rallied around a bill to pay the troops, buy ships and aircraft and set military policy.
WASHINGTON (AP) — Lawmakers are making contingency plans for what happens if — or when — the nuclear accord with Iran falls apart.
FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 22
NASHVILLE AREA
NASHVILLE (AP) - The former owner of a Nashville pediatric practice has pleaded guilty to health care fraud and was ordered to pay $1.6 million in restitution and damages.
MUSIC INDUSTRY
NASHVILLE (AP) — Country singer-songwriter John Prine says he's been diagnosed with an operable form of lung cancer.
AUTO INDUSTRY
DETROIT (AP) — The U.S. government expects to sell the last of its stake in General Motors by the end of the year, bringing an end to a sad chapter in the 105-year-old auto giant's history.
HEALTH CARE
NEW YORK (AP) — Technology experts say healing what ails the Healthcare.gov website will be a tougher task than the Obama administration acknowledges.
NATIONAL BUSINESS
NEW YORK (AP) — The Standard & Poor's 500 index is closing above 1,800 for the first time as encouraging news from the drug industry pushes stocks higher.
NEW YORK (AP) — The price of oil slipped to just under $95 Friday but still finished the week with a gain of $1 a barrel.
NEW YORK (AP) — Don't bet your shirt on a repeat performance. That's the message from some of the nation's biggest investment firms as the Dow Jones industrial average has closed above 16,000 for the first time and the Standard & Poor's 500 index is on the cusp of its best year in a decade with a gain of 25.9 percent.
WASHINGTON (AP) — U.S. job openings and overall hiring both reached five-year highs in September, signaling steady improvement in the job market.
NEW YORK (AP) — Airline passengers have already been stripped of their legroom, hot meals and personal space. Now, they might also lose their silence.
LOS ANGELES (AP) — Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates donned a cool leather jacket when he first introduced the Xbox onstage in 2000. More than a decade later, the video game console is still the hippest brand in Microsoft's portfolio. But as the company begins selling its first new Xbox in eight years on Friday, some critics say Microsoft should spin the gaming unit off. They argue that Xbox distracts management from the company's fast-growing cloud computing business and its effort to catch up to rivals in tablet and smartphone sales.
SAN JOSE, Calif. (AP) — A Silicon Valley jury on Thursday ordered Samsung Electronics to pay Apple $290 million for copying vital iPhone and iPad features.
ATLANTIC CITY, N.J. (AP) — Six of the seven casinos given permits to conduct Internet gambling in New Jersey were cleared to start taking bets Thursday night, while one — the Golden Nugget Atlantic City — was left out of the test after its systems did not pass rigorous state testing.
NATIONAL POLITICS
WASHINGTON (AP) — Eager to draw contrasts with Republicans, the White House is pushing its economic agenda as it attempts to give Democrats something to talk about other than the troubled health care rollout.
WASHINGTON (AP) — Senate Democrats eased the way for swift approval of President Barack Obama's current and future nominees on Thursday, voting unilaterally to overturn decades of Senate precedent and undermine Republicans' ability to block final votes.
WASHINGTON (AP) — A Senate panel on Thursday advanced Janet Yellen's nomination to lead the Federal Reserve, setting up a final vote in the full Senate after lawmakers return from a two-week Thanksgiving break.