This just in from Northrop Grumman:
WASHINGTON, D.C. — June 19, 2008 — Northrop Grumman Corporation (NYSE: NOC) announced today it is deferring the groundbreaking event for its KC-45 Tanker facilities previously scheduled for June 28, 2008 in Mobile, Ala.
With all the tumult in banking, a slowing economy and a rising unemployment rate, you’d think there’d be more blood in the executive suite than there is. But Liberum Research, which follows top executive and corporate director turnover, says firings of executives with “chief” in their title was actually down in June from last year.
Liberum was puzzled by the results, but says it’s probably an anomaly and C-level turnover will catch up this summer. Those sectors with the highest turnover: drugs, banks and manufacturing.
Lots of comments from politicians around the country following Wednesday’s ruling by the GAO that upheld Boeing’s protest that the bidding process on the tanker contract was flawed. The best, though, might have come from Alabama Gov. Bob Riley. He reportedly was in an editorial board meeting at Bloomberg News headquarters in New York when word of the decision came down. His response: “Oh, God, that’s not good.”
Earlier, he told the editorial board that it would take “an absolute nutcase” to think Boeing’s tanker bid was better than the one offered by Northrop Grumman/EADS. Apparently Gov. Riley has already met members of our Congressional delegation.
Most of the complaints from the Gulf Coast, where Airbus plans to build the new tanker, concern the delays that will be caused by Boeing’s protest. There also are complaints that politics are playing a role in the bidding process. Let’s see: Potential $100 billion contract being debated in Washington, D.C. with tens of thousands of jobs attached. And there are politics involved? I’m shocked, I tell you. Shocked.
Kansas and Washington lawmakers were doing the squealing when Boeing originally lost the contract. Now it’s Alabama’s turn. Just remember that this thing is a long way from over.
I’m all atwitter.
OK, not really. Actually, I’m just Twittering. My friend and colleague Denise Neil signed me up on Twitter, the site that lets people know what you’re doing every minute of the day, if you choose to tell them.
I confess that, just like this ridiculousness over Facebook, LinkedIn and all those other Web sites where people keep requesting me as a friend, I still don’t get it. But I realize I need to. So I’m trying. I hear we’re even going to offer a course in the newsroom to teach us to use Facebook for networking purposes. I’m sorry, but I thought that’s what the three martini lunch was for.
Part of what I hate about all this online business (aside from all those user names and passwords that I can never remember) is the sites never seem to work when I go to them. For instance, my first experience with Twitter moments ago? The site said: “Twitter is over capacity. Too many tweets! Please wait a moment and try again.” And yesterday on Facebook when I tried to take a “likeness quiz” that our online editor sent me, it said, “URL not found.”
I don’t have time for this!
But as Jeff Butts, one of our online gurus, Twittered just yesterday about me: “Tell her that resistance is futile. She will be assimilated.”
Fine. So I just Twittered that I was going to blog about Twittering. And now I’m blogging about Twittering. I’d go back and Twitter that I’ve successfully blogged on Twittering, but I think the paper is expecting a column from me, too. I’ll update Twitter as I go, and I’ll be back to blog on that soon.
After further review, Wednesday’s bombshell announcement from a Florida gaming group that they’d like to reopen Wild West World isn’t quite so shocking – in context.
But if the Wild West World story teaches us anything, it’s not to count our overpriced stale corn dogs before they’re fried to the consistency of the asphalt under our feet.
It’s pretty clear, I think, that Alan Ginsburg’s AHG Group agreed to buy the park Wednesday with an eye toward gaming, and a willingness to put a bunch of entertainment pieces like an amusement park in place while gambling winds its way through the local political maze. So maybe one can conclude that Wichita isn’t an entertainment loser.
Or maybe not.
The sale contract hasn’t been filed and signed with U.S. Bankruptcy Court, as of this writing. That’s because the deal Thomas Etheredge assembled is a complicated mess, thanks to the one thing he did consistently as he built the park – look for the cheapest route possible. It’s not easy to sell a parking lot to a savvy real estate buyer on “payments only” terms.
No real reason to doubt Ginsburg’s interest. But don’t put all your chips on the Floridians quite yet. This deal isn’t going to be over until the final buzzer.
Michael Moodenbaugh and Robert Barnard left for Florida 18 months ago amid a lot of anger and accusations that the city of Wichita, their insurance broker and others had run them out of business in their rocky attempt to reopen Joyland in 2006. (They were cited by the city for not having the proper licenses, neighbors complained about late-night noise and he left a trail of unpaid bills)
Well, they’re back, sort of. The two called today and said they will pursue legal action against the city and others. They plan to send a letter to the city next week laying out their complaints and will file suit in 120 days if they don’t get satisfaction.
Moodenbaugh has the uncanny ability to rub just about everyone he meets the wrong way, but you got to admit the guy is relentless.
The American Bankers Association released yesterday the results of a survey that said 91 percent of people 55 and older have not paid overdraft fees in the past year.
While the ABA said the survey question was aimed at countering claims by the Center for Responsible Lending that overdraft fees were hurting seniors, the results point to something else:
Overdrawing a checking account is simply not acceptable to older generations of Americans.
Yet in this day and age of easy credit and the many banks that market overdraft protection products, it seems to have become an acceptable practice by my generation — Generation X — and younger ones.
Write a check for more than your account can cover, pay the fee and move on.
Seems to me there’s something wrong with that kind of thinking.
Do you think it’s too late to get the GAO to look into that grade Mrs. Shippy gave me in journalism class during the fourth quarter of my senior year of high school? I know it was 20 years ago, but I’m still bitter.
For those of you like me who like – well, used to like – an end-of-the-month gas bill, the credit card era appears primed to become the latest victim of runaway gas prices.
It’s inevitable. Retailers trying to sell gas on razor-thin margins found themselves turned into loss-leader retailers by credit company surcharges. Often as high as 3 percent of the sale, the credit card charges erase any profits retailers make.
Sad news. Personally, I wish the credit card companies would make their cash elsewhere. And with their evolution into national payday loan companies, complete with outrageous interest rates, that’s exactly what they’re doing.
Speaking of profiteering, chew on this little gem: Wall Street doesn’t want Congress to crack down on the speculation that many experts believe is responsible for the runup in oil prices.
I wonder if this little forecast from one of the foxes that went down to the congressional henhouse Wednesday might have something to do with that concern.