<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>

<rdf:RDF
 xmlns:rdf="http://www.w3.org/1999/02/22-rdf-syntax-ns#"
 xmlns="http://purl.org/rss/1.0/"
 xmlns:content="http://purl.org/rss/1.0/modules/content/"
 xmlns:taxo="http://purl.org/rss/1.0/modules/taxonomy/"
 xmlns:dc="http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/"
 xmlns:syn="http://purl.org/rss/1.0/modules/syndication/"
 xmlns:admin="http://webns.net/mvcb/"
>

<channel rdf:about="http://regional.gourt.com/North-America/United-States/Rhode-Island/Business-and-Economy.html">
<title>Business_and_Economy RSS : Gourt</title>
<link>http://regional.gourt.com/North-America/United-States/Rhode-Island/Business-and-Economy.html</link>
<description></description>
<dc:language>en-us</dc:language>
<dc:rights>Copyright 2007, Gourt.com</dc:rights>
<dc:date>2008-07-19T12:55+14:00
</dc:date>
<dc:publisher>rtruog@gourt.com</dc:publisher>
<dc:creator>rtruog@gourt.com</dc:creator>
<dc:subject>Business_and_Economy RSS : Gourt</dc:subject>
<syn:updatePeriod>hourly</syn:updatePeriod>
<syn:updateFrequency>1</syn:updateFrequency>
<syn:updateBase>1901-01-01T00:00+00:00</syn:updateBase>
<items>
 <rdf:Seq>
  <rdf:li rdf:resource="http://rssfeeds.usatoday.com/~r/UsatodaycomNation-TopStories/~3/339932748/2008-07-19-refinery-probe_N.htm" />
  <rdf:li rdf:resource="http://rssfeeds.usatoday.com/~r/UsatodaycomNation-TopStories/~3/339271890/2008-07-18-southeast-storm_N.htm" />
  <rdf:li rdf:resource="http://rssfeeds.usatoday.com/~r/UsatodaycomNation-TopStories/~3/339163309/2008-07-19-facebook-trials_N.htm" />
  <rdf:li rdf:resource="http://rssfeeds.usatoday.com/~r/UsatodaycomNation-TopStories/~3/339892148/2008-07-19-florida-search_N.htm" />
  <rdf:li rdf:resource="http://rssfeeds.usatoday.com/~r/UsatodaycomNation-TopStories/~3/339025211/2008-07-18-jail_N.htm" />
  <rdf:li rdf:resource="http://rssfeeds.usatoday.com/~r/UsatodaycomNation-TopStories/~3/339646411/2008-07-19-calorie-info_N.htm" />
  <rdf:li rdf:resource="http://rssfeeds.usatoday.com/~r/UsatodaycomNation-TopStories/~3/339592610/2008-07-18-missing-soldier_N.htm" />
  <rdf:li rdf:resource="http://rssfeeds.usatoday.com/~r/UsatodaycomNation-TopStories/~3/339523632/2008-07-18-plane-ohare_N.htm" />
  <rdf:li rdf:resource="http://rssfeeds.usatoday.com/~r/UsatodaycomNation-TopStories/~3/339503244/2008-07-18-flight-diverted_N.htm" />
  <rdf:li rdf:resource="http://rssfeeds.usatoday.com/~r/UsatodaycomNation-TopStories/~3/339465723/2008-07-18-california-salmon_N.htm" />
  <rdf:li rdf:resource="http://rssfeeds.usatoday.com/~r/UsatodaycomNation-TopStories/~3/339455921/2008-07-18-office-shooting_N.htm" />
  <rdf:li rdf:resource="http://rssfeeds.usatoday.com/~r/UsatodaycomNation-TopStories/~3/339437489/2008-07-18-wolf-delisting_N.htm" />
  <rdf:li rdf:resource="http://rssfeeds.usatoday.com/~r/UsatodaycomNation-TopStories/~3/339437490/2008-07-18-us-army-pigs_N.htm" />
  <rdf:li rdf:resource="http://rssfeeds.usatoday.com/~r/UsatodaycomNation-TopStories/~3/339437491/2008-07-18-houston-crane-collapse_N.htm" />
  <rdf:li rdf:resource="http://rssfeeds.usatoday.com/~r/UsatodaycomNation-TopStories/~3/339376565/2008-07-18-sept-11-anniversary_N.htm" />
  <rdf:li rdf:resource="http://www.economist.com/world/na/displaystory.cfm?story_id=11750800&#x26;fsrc=RSS" />
  <rdf:li rdf:resource="http://www.economist.com/world/na/displaystory.cfm?story_id=11750600&#x26;fsrc=RSS" />
  <rdf:li rdf:resource="http://www.economist.com/world/na/displaystory.cfm?story_id=11750607&#x26;fsrc=RSS" />
  <rdf:li rdf:resource="http://www.economist.com/world/na/displaystory.cfm?story_id=11750614&#x26;fsrc=RSS" />
  <rdf:li rdf:resource="http://www.economist.com/world/na/displaystory.cfm?story_id=11750621&#x26;fsrc=RSS" />
  <rdf:li rdf:resource="http://www.economist.com/world/na/displaystory.cfm?story_id=11750666&#x26;fsrc=RSS" />
  <rdf:li rdf:resource="http://www.economist.com/world/na/displaystory.cfm?story_id=11750793&#x26;fsrc=RSS" />
  <rdf:li rdf:resource="http://www.economist.com/world/na/displaystory.cfm?story_id=11750356&#x26;fsrc=RSS" />
  <rdf:li rdf:resource="http://www.economist.com/world/na/displaystory.cfm?story_id=11707305&#x26;fsrc=RSS" />
  <rdf:li rdf:resource="http://www.economist.com/world/na/displaystory.cfm?story_id=11707298&#x26;fsrc=RSS" />
  <rdf:li rdf:resource="http://www.economist.com/world/na/displaystory.cfm?story_id=11707289&#x26;fsrc=RSS" />
  <rdf:li rdf:resource="http://www.economist.com/world/na/displaystory.cfm?story_id=11707282&#x26;fsrc=RSS" />
  <rdf:li rdf:resource="http://www.economist.com/world/na/displaystory.cfm?story_id=11707275&#x26;fsrc=RSS" />
  <rdf:li rdf:resource="http://www.economist.com/world/na/displaystory.cfm?story_id=11707268&#x26;fsrc=RSS" />
  <rdf:li rdf:resource="http://www.economist.com/world/na/displaystory.cfm?story_id=11707142&#x26;fsrc=RSS" />
  <rdf:li rdf:resource="http://www.economist.com/world/na/displaystory.cfm?story_id=11707123&#x26;fsrc=RSS" />
  <rdf:li rdf:resource="http://www.economist.com/world/na/displaystory.cfm?story_id=11670712&#x26;fsrc=RSS" />
  <rdf:li rdf:resource="http://www.economist.com/world/na/displaystory.cfm?story_id=11670747&#x26;fsrc=RSS" />
  <rdf:li rdf:resource="http://www.economist.com/world/na/displaystory.cfm?story_id=11670740&#x26;fsrc=RSS" />
 </rdf:Seq>
</items>
</channel>

<item rdf:about="http://rssfeeds.usatoday.com/~r/UsatodaycomNation-TopStories/~3/339932748/2008-07-19-refinery-probe_N.htm">
<title>Investigators arrive at site of crane collapse</title>
<link>http://rssfeeds.usatoday.com/~r/UsatodaycomNation-TopStories/~3/339932748/2008-07-19-refinery-probe_N.htm</link>
<description><![CDATA[Hitting the ground with enough force to bounce a nearby worker off the ground, one of the nation's largest mobile cranes collapsed ...
]]></description>
</item>

<item rdf:about="http://rssfeeds.usatoday.com/~r/UsatodaycomNation-TopStories/~3/339271890/2008-07-18-southeast-storm_N.htm">
<title>Carolinas may see tropical storm</title>
<link>http://rssfeeds.usatoday.com/~r/UsatodaycomNation-TopStories/~3/339271890/2008-07-18-southeast-storm_N.htm</link>
<description><![CDATA[A tropical depression off the Southeast coast is the first to threaten the U.S. this hurricane season, and forecasters said Saturday ...
]]></description>
</item>

<item rdf:about="http://rssfeeds.usatoday.com/~r/UsatodaycomNation-TopStories/~3/339163309/2008-07-19-facebook-trials_N.htm">
<title>Facebook used as character evidence, lands some in jail</title>
<link>http://rssfeeds.usatoday.com/~r/UsatodaycomNation-TopStories/~3/339163309/2008-07-19-facebook-trials_N.htm</link>
<description><![CDATA[In the age of the Internet, social networking sites have yielded critical character evidence for prosecutors.
]]></description>
</item>

<item rdf:about="http://rssfeeds.usatoday.com/~r/UsatodaycomNation-TopStories/~3/339892148/2008-07-19-florida-search_N.htm">
<title>Cadaver dogs join search for missing Fla. girl </title>
<link>http://rssfeeds.usatoday.com/~r/UsatodaycomNation-TopStories/~3/339892148/2008-07-19-florida-search_N.htm</link>
<description><![CDATA[Sheriff's deputies have deployed trained cadaver dogs in the search for a 2-year-old girl in Orlando, who has been missing for ...
]]></description>
</item>

<item rdf:about="http://rssfeeds.usatoday.com/~r/UsatodaycomNation-TopStories/~3/339025211/2008-07-18-jail_N.htm">
<title>Horrendous conditions found at nation&#x27;s biggest jail</title>
<link>http://rssfeeds.usatoday.com/~r/UsatodaycomNation-TopStories/~3/339025211/2008-07-18-jail_N.htm</link>
<description><![CDATA[A federal investigation of the nation's largest single-site county jail has uncovered serious sanitation and medical care problems, ...
]]></description>
</item>

<item rdf:about="http://rssfeeds.usatoday.com/~r/UsatodaycomNation-TopStories/~3/339646411/2008-07-19-calorie-info_N.htm">
<title>A 540-calorie Big Mac? N.Y. chains post calorie info</title>
<link>http://rssfeeds.usatoday.com/~r/UsatodaycomNation-TopStories/~3/339646411/2008-07-19-calorie-info_N.htm</link>
<description><![CDATA[Customers at big fast-food chains in New York City are finally facing the facts about their meal choices. And for some, the truth ...
]]></description>
</item>

<item rdf:about="http://rssfeeds.usatoday.com/~r/UsatodaycomNation-TopStories/~3/339592610/2008-07-18-missing-soldier_N.htm">
<title>Police: Missing Texas soldier may be in danger</title>
<link>http://rssfeeds.usatoday.com/~r/UsatodaycomNation-TopStories/~3/339592610/2008-07-18-missing-soldier_N.htm</link>
<description><![CDATA[Police say a Fort Bliss soldier is considered in danger after she did not report for work Friday and evidence of foul play was ...
]]></description>
</item>

<item rdf:about="http://rssfeeds.usatoday.com/~r/UsatodaycomNation-TopStories/~3/339523632/2008-07-18-plane-ohare_N.htm">
<title>Plane overshoots O&#x27;Hare runway; no injuries</title>
<link>http://rssfeeds.usatoday.com/~r/UsatodaycomNation-TopStories/~3/339523632/2008-07-18-plane-ohare_N.htm</link>
<description><![CDATA[Authorities say no one was hurt when a Mexicana Airlines flight overshot a runway at Chicago's O'Hare International Airport.
]]></description>
</item>

<item rdf:about="http://rssfeeds.usatoday.com/~r/UsatodaycomNation-TopStories/~3/339503244/2008-07-18-flight-diverted_N.htm">
<title>FBI: Flight diverted as soccer team helps subdue naked man</title>
<link>http://rssfeeds.usatoday.com/~r/UsatodaycomNation-TopStories/~3/339503244/2008-07-18-flight-diverted_N.htm</link>
<description><![CDATA[An American Airlines flight from Boston to Los Angeles was diverted to Oklahoma City on Friday after a passenger stripped nude ...
]]></description>
</item>

<item rdf:about="http://rssfeeds.usatoday.com/~r/UsatodaycomNation-TopStories/~3/339465723/2008-07-18-california-salmon_N.htm">
<title>Judge: Water delivery system harms Calif. salmon</title>
<link>http://rssfeeds.usatoday.com/~r/UsatodaycomNation-TopStories/~3/339465723/2008-07-18-california-salmon_N.htm</link>
<description><![CDATA[A federal judge has ruled that California's water systems threaten to push native salmon into extinction, but stopped short ...
]]></description>
</item>

<item rdf:about="http://rssfeeds.usatoday.com/~r/UsatodaycomNation-TopStories/~3/339455921/2008-07-18-office-shooting_N.htm">
<title>Gunman kills ex-girlfriend, self in N.Y. office</title>
<link>http://rssfeeds.usatoday.com/~r/UsatodaycomNation-TopStories/~3/339455921/2008-07-18-office-shooting_N.htm</link>
<description><![CDATA[Authorities say a man shot his ex-girlfriend to death in her Long Island office before turning the gun on himself. A supervisor ...
]]></description>
</item>

<item rdf:about="http://rssfeeds.usatoday.com/~r/UsatodaycomNation-TopStories/~3/339437489/2008-07-18-wolf-delisting_N.htm">
<title>Judge: Return gray wolves to endangered list</title>
<link>http://rssfeeds.usatoday.com/~r/UsatodaycomNation-TopStories/~3/339437489/2008-07-18-wolf-delisting_N.htm</link>
<description><![CDATA[A federal judge in Montana has ordered that gray wolves in the northern Rockies be returned to the endangered species list.
]]></description>
</item>

<item rdf:about="http://rssfeeds.usatoday.com/~r/UsatodaycomNation-TopStories/~3/339437490/2008-07-18-us-army-pigs_N.htm">
<title>Army shoots live pigs in Hawaii in training drill for Iraq</title>
<link>http://rssfeeds.usatoday.com/~r/UsatodaycomNation-TopStories/~3/339437490/2008-07-18-us-army-pigs_N.htm</link>
<description><![CDATA[The Army says it's critical to saving the lives of wounded soldiers. Animal-rights activists call the training cruel and outdated.
]]></description>
</item>

<item rdf:about="http://rssfeeds.usatoday.com/~r/UsatodaycomNation-TopStories/~3/339437491/2008-07-18-houston-crane-collapse_N.htm">
<title>Officials: Crane collapse in Houston kills 4</title>
<link>http://rssfeeds.usatoday.com/~r/UsatodaycomNation-TopStories/~3/339437491/2008-07-18-houston-crane-collapse_N.htm</link>
<description><![CDATA[One of the largest mobile cranes in the United States collapsed at a Houston oil refinery Friday, killing four workers and injuring ...
]]></description>
</item>

<item rdf:about="http://rssfeeds.usatoday.com/~r/UsatodaycomNation-TopStories/~3/339376565/2008-07-18-sept-11-anniversary_N.htm">
<title>WTC site will be open again to families this 9/11</title>
<link>http://rssfeeds.usatoday.com/~r/UsatodaycomNation-TopStories/~3/339376565/2008-07-18-sept-11-anniversary_N.htm</link>
<description><![CDATA[Sept. 11 victims' families will be able to mourn their loved ones at the World Trade Center site again on the terrorist attacks' ...
]]></description>
</item>

<item rdf:about="http://www.economist.com/world/na/displaystory.cfm?story_id=11750800&#x26;fsrc=RSS">
<title>Requiem for a queen </title>
<link>http://www.economist.com/world/na/displaystory.cfm?story_id=11750800&#x26;fsrc=RSS</link>
<description><![CDATA[A riverine legend faces extinctionBARRING a last minute reprieve, America's last proper paddle-wheeled steamboat may disappear by the end of the year. For decades the Delta Queen has been one of the most magnificent sights on the Mississippi and Ohio rivers, forging through the water as her calliope steam organ blasts merrily away.But it looks as though the federal Coast Guard, applying the same regulations to riverboats as to ocean-going ships, will no longer allow the Delta Queen to carry passengers on overnight excursions. The problem is the wooden superstructure, the white wedding-cake of decks above the boat's mighty hull. In 1966 federal regulations banned any vessel with wooden superstructures from carrying more than 50 passengers on anything longer than day-trips. Congress granted the Delta Queen an exemption because she is never more than a few hundred yards from the safety of the river bank should a fire occur. Since then, the exemption has been extended nine times. But probably not for a tenth. ...]]></description>
</item>

<item rdf:about="http://www.economist.com/world/na/displaystory.cfm?story_id=11750600&#x26;fsrc=RSS">
<title>&#xA1;Voten por mi! </title>
<link>http://www.economist.com/world/na/displaystory.cfm?story_id=11750600&#x26;fsrc=RSS</link>
<description><![CDATA[Latino voters are turning away from John McCain. That's a symptom of a bigger problem for RepublicansONE of the dilemmas facing those who spoke at the National Council of La Raza this week was how to pronounce the Hispanic activist group's name. The first syllable of the word raza (race, or people) requires a tricky, un-English tongue movement. Some of the anglophone speakers who tried it sounded as though they were about to choke. John McCain made no attempt at all, pronouncing the "R" like the last letter of "Budweiser". Barack Obama, by contrast, breezed through the word as if he had grown up eating sopaipillas. Then, to show off, he did it again. Although less numerous than black voters, Latino voters may tip this year's presidential election. They make up 12% of the electorate in Colorado and Nevada, 14% in Florida and 37% in New Mexico (see map). In 2004 George Bush won all four of those states by five percentage points or less, and all four of them are regarded as key battlefields this time around. Florida, as the fourth-biggest state in the union and electorally one of the closest, is a place where the large Hispanic vote could well prove decisive: Jeb Bush, the president's brother and the governor of Florida at the time of the 2000 and 2004 elections, has a Hispanic wife and helped boost the Republican's share of the Latino vote there. But he is now gone. ...]]></description>
</item>

<item rdf:about="http://www.economist.com/world/na/displaystory.cfm?story_id=11750607&#x26;fsrc=RSS">
<title>In the line of fire </title>
<link>http://www.economist.com/world/na/displaystory.cfm?story_id=11750607&#x26;fsrc=RSS</link>
<description><![CDATA[Barack Obama describes his war aims which are still rather vagueIN 1960 John F. Kennedy won the presidency by, in part, making the counter-intuitive argument that his Republican opponents had been too soft on the Soviet Union. Nearly half a century later, Barack Obama seemed this week to be trying something of the same sort. On July 15th Mr Obama appeared on a stage with no fewer than eight American flags, not to mention the one he has recently started wearing on his lapel. He had his work cut out. Ever since he spoke of "refining" his plans for pulling out of Iraq, liberals have assailed him for backing away from his commitment to all but leave Iraq within 16 months of taking office. Centrists hoped he would further soften his determination to pull out quickly. And whichever way he went, conservatives would criticise him: for flip-flopping if he moved towards the centrists, or for ignoring the success of the American "surge" if he satisfied the left. The right, not known for its love of satire, was already particularly thrilled by the cover of this week's New Yorker, which shows Mr Obama and his wife dressed as terrorists. ...]]></description>
</item>

<item rdf:about="http://www.economist.com/world/na/displaystory.cfm?story_id=11750614&#x26;fsrc=RSS">
<title>Turbine time </title>
<link>http://www.economist.com/world/na/displaystory.cfm?story_id=11750614&#x26;fsrc=RSS</link>
<description><![CDATA[T. Boone Pickens takes to the skiesAMERICANS spend $700 billion a year on foreign oil. According to one observer, this is an addiction, a crisis, and a trap. The country must pursue alternative energy sources as fiercely as it once shot for the moon. So far, so much liberal boilerplate. The critic in question, however, is a Republican oilman: T. Boone Pickens. As he puts it, in an Okie drawl: "I've been an oilman all my life. But this is one emergency we can't drill our way out of." He wants America to make a huge investment in wind-power infrastructure. During this election season, he will personally spend $58m to make the case. Mr Pickens's interest is not solely altruistic. His company, Mesa Power, has already invested $2 billion to build the world's largest wind farm in Pampa, a small town in the Texas panhandle. He told a Senate committee in June that he is going to pay for the transmission lines that will carry Pampa's power to the Dallas area because he cannot wait for the state to build the infrastructure. As he likes to point out, he is 80 years old and worth $4 billion. So profit is not the only issue, either.  ...]]></description>
</item>

<item rdf:about="http://www.economist.com/world/na/displaystory.cfm?story_id=11750621&#x26;fsrc=RSS">
<title>Which way will capital vote? </title>
<link>http://www.economist.com/world/na/displaystory.cfm?story_id=11750621&#x26;fsrc=RSS</link>
<description><![CDATA[Business-minded voters have doubts about both candidatesFOR a short while in his early 20s, Barack Obama edited reports in New York for Business International, a publishing firm that was later bought by The Economist Group. He did not much like it, so he quit to become a community organiser. That was his only first-hand experience of business. John McCain has had even less, having spent his adult life as a pilot, prisoner-of-war and politician. Businesspeople might wonder if either candidate truly understands their worries. Both men are happy to take money from businesspeople, and both praise enterprise in the abstract. But both also snipe at supposed corporate villains. Mr Obama spent his primary campaign railing against oil firms, irresponsible mortgage lenders and overpaid bosses who export American jobs. Mr McCain fulminates pointlessly about oil speculators, and once dismissed a Republican rival, Mitt Romney, a successful businessman, by sneering: "I led...not for profit but for patriotism." ...]]></description>
</item>

<item rdf:about="http://www.economist.com/world/na/displaystory.cfm?story_id=11750666&#x26;fsrc=RSS">
<title>The Big Apple gets poorer </title>
<link>http://www.economist.com/world/na/displaystory.cfm?story_id=11750666&#x26;fsrc=RSS</link>
<description><![CDATA[The federal definition of poverty is challenged by local governmentFED UP with the slow-moving federal government, America's local municipalities and states have recently launched many reform plans themselves, including health care (Massachusetts's universal health initiatives) and global warming (California's emissions caps). New York City, already a model in policing and an emerging one in school reform, is now tackling poverty. To fight it properly you need good figures; as the late Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan once said, "you can't solve a problem until you can measure it." So Michael Bloomberg, New York's mayor, announced on July 13th an alternative to the federal poverty measure.  This measure, now 40 years old, assesses pre-tax cash income against a number of thresholds, based primarily on food spending. But this has decreased from one-third to one-eighth of average household spending over the past four decades. Housing, which now makes up more than 30% of family expenditure, is not taken into account. Nor are regional cost-of-living differences. A two-bedroom apartment, for instance, costs $1,318 a month in New York City and $1,592 in San Francisco, contrasting sharply with the national average of $867 and one Mississippi county's $498. On the income side, non-cash benefits such as subsidised housing and food stamps, are ignored. So is the earned-income tax credit, a wage subsidy geared towards the working poor.  ...]]></description>
</item>

<item rdf:about="http://www.economist.com/world/na/displaystory.cfm?story_id=11750793&#x26;fsrc=RSS">
<title>Learning their lesson </title>
<link>http://www.economist.com/world/na/displaystory.cfm?story_id=11750793&#x26;fsrc=RSS</link>
<description><![CDATA[Can a teachers' union be an engine for reform?THE election on July 14th of Randi Weingarten as president marks a new era for the American Federation of Teachers (AFT), or so the union says. For years teachers' unions have been demonised as the main obstacles to school reform, often with good reason. Now the AFT is billing Ms Weingarten as a "reform-minded advocate". With American students lagging, Ms Weingarten insists that "the union is the solution." She has some convincing to do. If any teachers' union were to promote reform, it would be the AFT, America's second-biggest. While the larger National Education Association has historically been less nimble, the AFT's president from 1974 to 1997, Al Shanker, supported accountability and even some pay-for-performance schemes. ("I used to shy away from bribery," he reportedly said, "but I've come to the conclusion that it has a place.") Today the AFT supports such bonuses, if negotiated with a local union. It also represents teachers in more than 70 charter (publicly funded but self-governing) schools, in ten states.  ...]]></description>
</item>

<item rdf:about="http://www.economist.com/world/na/displaystory.cfm?story_id=11750356&#x26;fsrc=RSS">
<title>Cobbling together a dream ticket </title>
<link>http://www.economist.com/world/na/displaystory.cfm?story_id=11750356&#x26;fsrc=RSS</link>
<description><![CDATA[John McCain and Barack Obama need to err on the side of caution in choosing their running-matesTHE foundations of American capitalism may be going up in flames. But no amount of dismal economic news can dull the appetite of Washingtonians for playing one of the oldest games in town--picking the candidates' running-mates. Every other day seems to bring news of one potential candidate rising (Al Gore is flavour of the moment on the Democratic side) or another one flaming out (Carly Fiorina, the former head of Hewlett-Packard, doomed her campaign for the Republican slot when she complained loudly that some health-care plans cover Viagra but not the birth-control pill, sinful to many conservatives). This enthusiasm is partly the result of the sheer pleasure of the game. Playing the veep-stakes allows pundits to display their knowledge of obscure governors in swing states and arcane bits of political history. But the game also has a serious side. John Adams, the country's first vice-president, described the job as "the most insignificant office that ever the invention of man contrived or his imagination conceived." John Nance Garner, FDR's first vice-president, dismissed it as "not worth a pitcher of warm piss." But in recent years the urine has turned golden. Al Gore presided over high-profile programmes such as "reinventing government". Dick Cheney was almost a co-president.  ...]]></description>
</item>

<item rdf:about="http://www.economist.com/world/na/displaystory.cfm?story_id=11707305&#x26;fsrc=RSS">
<title>The sheriff?s stash </title>
<link>http://www.economist.com/world/na/displaystory.cfm?story_id=11707305&#x26;fsrc=RSS</link>
<description><![CDATA[What happens to all that seized money and stuff?IN 2005 the Montgomery County district attorney's office held a party at the county fair in east Texas. They had beer, liquor and a margarita machine. The district attorney, Mike McDougal, at first denied that this had been paid for by drug money. He acknowledged that his office had a margarita machine at the fair. In fact, he said, they won first prize for best margarita. But he insisted they came by it fair and square. In any case, he pointed out, the county's drug fund was at his discretion. Under Texas forfeiture law, counties can keep most of the money and property they rustle up.As the drug war continues, the practice of asset forfeiture has come under question. Last year, according to the Drug Enforcement Administration, $12 billion was smuggled from the United States to Mexico. Federal officials seized about $1.6 billion of that. State and local agencies got many millions more. The idea is to discourage drug smugglers by taking away their profits. At the federal level, forfeited assets go into a dedicated fund. But at state level, various rules apply. In Indiana, for example, extra money goes to a general school fund. In Texas, most of it stays with the sheriffs or district attorneys whose offices found it. ...]]></description>
</item>

<item rdf:about="http://www.economist.com/world/na/displaystory.cfm?story_id=11707298&#x26;fsrc=RSS">
<title>Better marks, more money </title>
<link>http://www.economist.com/world/na/displaystory.cfm?story_id=11707298&#x26;fsrc=RSS</link>
<description><![CDATA[An idea to improve and revive the capital's woeful schoolsBAD schools, the left insists, are bad because they do not have enough money. The nation's capital somewhat undermines this theory. Spending per pupil in Washington, DC, is a whopping 50% higher than the national average, yet the city's public schools are atrocious. If it were a state, its pupils' test scores would rank dead last. Some schools struggle with the basics, such as discipline. Until last year, for example, the Johnson Middle School "had a nightclub on every floor", says Clarence Burrell, a youth adviser at the school. There would be dozens of kids hanging out on each corridor during classes, schoolboys "with their shirts off getting massages" from female classmates and fights "all the time", he says.  ...]]></description>
</item>

<item rdf:about="http://www.economist.com/world/na/displaystory.cfm?story_id=11707289&#x26;fsrc=RSS">
<title>Love me, love me not </title>
<link>http://www.economist.com/world/na/displaystory.cfm?story_id=11707289&#x26;fsrc=RSS</link>
<description><![CDATA[America's confused, and sometimes scared, relationship with foreign investorsEIGHTY-FIVE Alabamians will descend on Britain on July 13th. Despite the timing, they will not be tourists in garish shorts. This group wears pinstriped suits and includes Alabama's governor. Their destination is the Farnborough Air Show. Their goal, in flying overseas, is to convince foreign investors to return the favour. In America's political lexicon, few words are more poisonous than "outsourcing". Foreign direct investment in America, meanwhile, is politically fraught, as witness the uproar in St Louis, Missouri, over a Belgian brewer's bid for Anheuser-Busch. But behind this debate, foreign investors are being wooed by a growing number of politicians, from Manhattan to Mobile, Alabama. "Globalisation is a reality," explains Sam Jones, Mobile's mayor. "You can sit around and wish that something else was taking place or you can take advantage of globalisation, what we call 'insourcing'." ...]]></description>
</item>

<item rdf:about="http://www.economist.com/world/na/displaystory.cfm?story_id=11707282&#x26;fsrc=RSS">
<title>A rise and a fall </title>
<link>http://www.economist.com/world/na/displaystory.cfm?story_id=11707282&#x26;fsrc=RSS</link>
<description><![CDATA[Bobby Jindal's broken promises may cost him dearNOT so long ago, Bobby Jindal was riding high. After sweeping into office in January, Louisiana's 37-year-old governor--America's first of Indian-American descent--had notched up his first big win, pushing an ambitious ethics package through the state legislature. He showed political acumen in the next session, too, managing to take credit for a tax cut passed by the legislature that his administration hadn't sought or even wanted.Mr Jindal's youth, colour, brains and conservative bona fides stood out in a Republican Party that is increasingly seen as a bastion of old white people. So when John McCain, the Republican nominee for president, received the young governor in May at his Arizona ranch, people began to murmur that Mr Jindal might become his running-mate.  ...]]></description>
</item>

<item rdf:about="http://www.economist.com/world/na/displaystory.cfm?story_id=11707275&#x26;fsrc=RSS">
<title>The Paine dilemma </title>
<link>http://www.economist.com/world/na/displaystory.cfm?story_id=11707275&#x26;fsrc=RSS</link>
<description><![CDATA[A worthy, but tricky, candidateLUMINARIES of the American Revolution are much revered and endlessly biographied. But in the South reverence only goes so far when it comes to Thomas Paine. Paine, an Englishman who helped design the American revolution and wrote, in "The Rights of Man", the best defence of the revolution in France, was a freethinker who scorned organised religion as well as kings: not a recipe for popularity in the Bible Belt.  Last year Lindsley Smith, an Arkansas legislator, tried to establish a Thomas Paine Day in her state. Forty-six lawmakers supported her (20 said no), but she needed 51 votes for her bill to pass, and 34 legislators did not vote at all--probably because they had no idea who Paine was. She will try again in January and, in the meantime, plans to educate Arkansans in general, and the state's politicians in particular, about what Paine did and why he should be honoured.  ...]]></description>
</item>

<item rdf:about="http://www.economist.com/world/na/displaystory.cfm?story_id=11707268&#x26;fsrc=RSS">
<title>My country, ?tis of thee </title>
<link>http://www.economist.com/world/na/displaystory.cfm?story_id=11707268&#x26;fsrc=RSS</link>
<description><![CDATA[The candidates pitch their appeals to Americans' most selfless instinctsBILL CLINTON'S campaign tune was "Don't stop thinking about tomorrow". George Bush claimed to be a compassionate conservative. John McCain's oft-repeated catch-phrase is "a cause greater than self". Instead of encouraging Americans to spend money after the terrorist attacks of September 11th 2001, he says, leaders should have exhorted Americans to serve their country. That, he told an audience of independent voters in St Paul, Minnesota last month, "is what I believe I can inspire a generation of Americans to do."Barack Obama is sounding the same theme. Last week in Colorado he lectured Americans about their responsibility to change their country, a topic he expounded at greater length in May, when he told a group of graduating university students that "individual salvation depends on collective salvation", not a surrender to America's "money culture". Getting them to serve "a greater good", he said, would be a major goal of his presidency.  ...]]></description>
</item>

<item rdf:about="http://www.economist.com/world/na/displaystory.cfm?story_id=11707142&#x26;fsrc=RSS">
<title>Out of the wilderness </title>
<link>http://www.economist.com/world/na/displaystory.cfm?story_id=11707142&#x26;fsrc=RSS</link>
<description><![CDATA[People are shunning the great outdoors. Blame conservationists, not video gamesON JULY 4th, normally the busiest public holiday of the year, tourists were put off by high petrol prices and more than 300 wildfires raging across California. On Memorial Day, traditionally the beginning of the summer season, it was cold. In 1999 there was a grisly murder. In 1997 the Merced river flooded, inundating a hotel and wiping out hundreds of campsites. There are always excuses for the absence of people in Yosemite National Park.The number of visitors to California's most spectacular valley has dropped for nine out of the past 13 years, and seems to be heading down again this year. Even in 2007--a relatively busy year--attendance was 11% below the mid-1990s peak. In America as a whole the number of visitors to national parks and historic sites peaked in 1987. Visitors are staying for less time and camping less often, especially in the wilderness. And rangers are hearing less American-accented English. Were it not for British and German tourists enjoying the weak dollar, the parks would be desolate. ...]]></description>
</item>

<item rdf:about="http://www.economist.com/world/na/displaystory.cfm?story_id=11707123&#x26;fsrc=RSS">
<title>New and improved </title>
<link>http://www.economist.com/world/na/displaystory.cfm?story_id=11707123&#x26;fsrc=RSS</link>
<description><![CDATA[The only problem with Barack Obama's move to the centre is that he's not moving far enoughTHE reaction to Jesse Helms's death on July 4th is a reminder of how bipolar American politics has become. The right praised him as a man of principle who also overflowed with the milk of human kindness. The left retorted--rightly, in our view--that he was also a bigot and a bully (see article). But at least conservatives and liberals have discovered one thing they can agree on: that Barack Obama is a cynical opportunist, a flip-flopper and a shape-changer, a man who brushes aside his principles with the same nonchalance that lesser mortals reserve for their dandruff. Bob Herbert of the New York Times worries that Mr Obama is "not just tacking gently to the centre. He's lurching right when it suits him, and he's zigging with the kind of reckless abandon that's guaranteed to cause disillusion, if not whiplash." Some 22,000 people have protested on his website about his change of heart on wiretapping. A group called "Recreate68" promises to complain about his move to the centre at the Democratic convention in Denver in August.  ...]]></description>
</item>

<item rdf:about="http://www.economist.com/world/na/displaystory.cfm?story_id=11670712&#x26;fsrc=RSS">
<title>What next? </title>
<link>http://www.economist.com/world/na/displaystory.cfm?story_id=11670712&#x26;fsrc=RSS</link>
<description><![CDATA[Congress ponders how to throw more money at the slumping economyFOR months Washington has waited for the economic stimulus plan George Bush signed in February to take effect. And now it has, earlier than some expected. The government reported on June 27th that the tax rebates included in the package helped increase real after-tax incomes by 5.3% in May, and consumers increased their spending at twice the rate they did in April. Still, as even George Bush admitted at the time of announcing it, the stimulus will be no more than a temporary "booster shot". Stimulus or no, the government announced on July 3rd that employers cut another 62,000 jobs in June. That is the sixth straight month of job losses. And despite the stimulus's help raising incomes in May, wages still lagged behind inflation, reflecting the weak labour market and rocketing prices for commodities, especially oil. Consumer confidence is now lower than in the last three recessions. House prices continue to fall, and Wall Street worries about more huge losses at big banks. All ominous enough to get policymakers talking seriously. ...]]></description>
</item>

<item rdf:about="http://www.economist.com/world/na/displaystory.cfm?story_id=11670747&#x26;fsrc=RSS">
<title>Valete </title>
<link>http://www.economist.com/world/na/displaystory.cfm?story_id=11670747&#x26;fsrc=RSS</link>
<description><![CDATA[A tradition in decline ONE fixture of college life is rapidly disappearing. Yearbooks, those beloved annual publications recording the events and people of the academic year, are suffering from plummeting print-runs, or are even being dropped altogether, in colleges across the country. The phenomenon is due in part to the price of the hard-bound volumes, typically as high as $75. For cash-strapped students facing ever-rising tuition and living costs they are a luxury that many can't afford. But the main cause is not the cost so much as the replacement of print with electronic media by and for the Facebook and MySpace generation. With social networks linking hundreds of friends and offering digital photographs and videos the traditional yearbook looks like a bit of a dinosaur.  ...]]></description>
</item>

<item rdf:about="http://www.economist.com/world/na/displaystory.cfm?story_id=11670740&#x26;fsrc=RSS">
<title>Showdown </title>
<link>http://www.economist.com/world/na/displaystory.cfm?story_id=11670740&#x26;fsrc=RSS</link>
<description><![CDATA[Gun owners are becoming emboldened. That may be prematureON JUNE 26th the Supreme Court overturned the District of Columbia's handgun ban and asserted that individuals have the right to own guns. Gun enthusiasts rejoiced. But as they move to capitalise on this favourable judgment, they may run into new problems. Consider two developing gun-rights controversies. On July 1st Florida became the fourth state to allow people to bring their guns to work. The gun has to stay locked in the car, and its owner must have a concealed-weapons permit. You cannot bring your gun if you work in a school, hospital, prison or power plant.  ...]]></description>
</item>

</rdf:RDF>