:Peanut Butter News

Full Story At CBS News

AP) Speculation continued to swirl Monday that a deal for General Motors Corp. to buy Chrysler LLC from New York private equity firm Cerberus Capital Management LP could come soon.

Both sides have been talking for months, but the pace recently has increased. A person familiar with the negotiations told The Associated Press Friday that officials were trying to work out a deal by the end of the month.

Cerberus wants out of the auto business. And as the credit markets have dried up, GM, worried about running too low on cash before the U.S. auto market rebounds, wants Chrysler’s currency stockpile.

The person said that the talks have advanced to the point where top executives of both companies have looked at a deal and asked for refinements. The person spoke on condition of anonymity because the talks are secret.

No Comments

Full Story At CBS News

(CBS) If you’re taking particular prescription medications, they may not be as effective as they could be if you eat certain foods, says registered dietician and Early Show contributor Keri Glassman.

That’s because of the way those drugs interact with the foods, she explains.

Here are a few Glassman says you should steer clear of. Right off the bat is one food group that may surprise you:

GREEN LEAFY VEGETABLES

IF you’re taking blood thinners. Your good-for-you greens contain vitamin K, which helps clot blood, the opposite of what thinners do. Your dose is customized to you, so if you eat say a salad a day, continue doing that, but don’t all of a sudden become Popeye!

No Comments

Full Stort At Outside the Lines - CNET News

How do you compete with free? That’s the question Steve Ballmer, Microsoft’s CEO, is trying to answer every morning when he goes to work. On the server software side, Windows Server is doing well, especially with the Exchange e-mail server and the unheralded but very good collaboration server, SharePoint. These products have matured, they’re relatively easy to set up and manage by IT organizations. The Exchange component is a spectacular success: it manages e-mail, contacts, calendars for hundreds of thousands of organizations all over the world. Even Apple finally embraced Exchange: the iPhone now syncs well with Microsoft’s server and the next version of OS X promises “native” Exchange support. In plainer English: Apple’s Mail, Address Book and iCal programs, for example, will sync with Exchange “out-of-the-box” just like the iPhone does. (This will be a relief to suffering Entourage users. Entourage is Microsoft’s own Outlook sibling on the Mac, but it is a poor relative and lacks Windows’ Outlook depth and polish.) Seeing that Windows Server generated more than $20 billion last year, one is tempted to think everything is going swimmingly.

No Comments

Full Story At CNN.com

(CNN) — A 6-year-old boy abducted Wednesday in Las Vegas, Nevada, has been found safe, the Las Vegas police department announced early Sunday.
Cole Puffinburger was found walking alone in east Las Vegas, police say.

Cole Puffinburger was found walking alone in east Las Vegas, police say.

“Cole (Puffinburger) has been found, he is safe and in our custody,” Capt. Vince Cannito told reporters in an early morning news conference.

Cannito said that while detectives were canvassing Las Vegas neighborhoods Saturday night with flyers about the boy’s abduction, they got a report that a young boy who matched Cole’s description was seen walking alone on a sidewalk on the city’s east side.

“Detectives rushed there, found the boy and confirmed it was Cole,” Cannito said.

“It’s just a blessing that this child has been found and he’s in extremely good condition,” the captain added.

Cole’s father, Robert Puffinburger, said the emotion he felt after being i

No Comments

Full Story At  Newsday.com

Samsung and other consumer-electronics heavyweights are uniting to support a technology that could send high-definition video signals wirelessly from a single set-top box to screens around the home.

The consortium announced Wednesday is an important development in the race to create a definitive way to replace tangles of video cables, but doesn’t end it — both Sony and Samsung also are supporting a competing technology.

In the new consortium, Sony Corp. and Samsung Electronics Co., along with Motorola Inc., Sharp Corp. and Hitachi Ltd., will develop an industry standard around technology from Amimon Ltd. of Israel called WHDI, for Wireless Home Digital Interface.

No Comments

Full Story At  washingtonpost.com

Nobody wants to think about their brain’s shrinking. But our brains do so as we age.

They decrease in size by about 2 percent per decade, and the brains of drinkers may shrink more quickly, according to a study published Monday in the Archives of Neurology, a publication of the American Medical Association. Those who drank most saw the most shrinkage. Women’s brains suffered more than men’s, perhaps because women tend to be smaller than men and may metabolize alcohol differently.

The research team, led by Carol Ann Paul, an instructor in the neuroscience program at Wellesley College in Wellesley, Mass., had hypothesized that low to moderate alcohol consumption might actually protect against brain shrinkage. No such luck. (For news about a possible way for older people to keep their brains sharp, see tomorrow’s The Checkup entry.)

On the other hand, drinking didn’t seem to accelerate the formation of white matter lesions on the brain, another phenomenon of aging that may contribute to cognitive decline. This research found no such effect.

No Comments

Full Story At Bloomberg.com.

Oct. 15 (Bloomberg) — New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo is investigating “unwarranted and outrageous expenditures” at American International Group Inc., which received an $85 billion federal bailout last month.

In a letter to AIG’s board of directors, Cuomo demanded the company stop “extravagant” expenditures and recover millions of dollars in unreasonable payments, or face legal action.

Cuomo cited a $5 million bonus and a $15 million “golden parachute” AIG awarded its chief executive officer in March. Martin Sullivan was AIG’s CEO at the time. Cuomo said the company also spent hundreds of thousands of dollars on “luxurious retreats” for executives, including an overseas hunting party and a golf outing.

“The party is over,” Cuomo said today at a press conference on Wall Street in lower Manhattan. “No more hunting trips. No more luxury resorts. They are not going to have the party and leave the hangover for the taxpayers.”

No Comments

Full Story At ABC News

Kurt wanted to buy a home for his wife and two children — and he wanted to do it through a mortgage he could afford. But the 44-year-old Chicago man had spent time in prison on drug charges and hadn’t been able to build up a credit history.
piggybacking
Is “renting” a stranger’s credit line a good way to boost your credit score and secure a home loan?
(ABC News Photo Illustration)

Kurt — who asked that his last name be withheld to protect his family’s privacy — said he had turned his life around after prison. But, when it came to buying a home, his low credit score meant that he faced what he called “ungodly” high interest rates of 12 to 13 percent.

No Comments