NewsTrust - All Rated Stories

The End of Wall Street's Boom

Tue, 11 Nov 2008 00:00:00 -0800

Portfolio - By Michael Lewis - Nov. 11 (Special Report) - ... I had been waiting for the end of Wall Street. The outrageous bonuses, the slender returns to shareholders, the never-ending scandals, the bursting of the internet bubble, the crisis following the collapse of Long-Term Capital Management: Over and over again, the big Wall Street investment banks would be, in some narrow way, discredited. Yet they just kept on growing, along with the sums of money that they doled out to 26-year-olds to perform tasks of no obvious social utility. The rebellion by American youth against the money culture never happened. Why bother to overturn your parents’ world when you can buy it, slice it up into tranches, and sell off the pieces?

NewsTrust Rating: 4.3 average - 8 Reviews » - Review It Visit NewsTrust | About | Sign Up | Disclaimer

Possible McCain-Fiorina Ticket

Mon, 02 Jun 2008 00:00:00 -0700

Portfolio - By Matthew Cooper - Jun. 02 (Special Report) - Some three and a half years after she was ousted from H.P., Fiorina has a new title that's grand, even if her office is not. She's the victory chair of the Republican National Committee...it means she's a roving ambassador for the G.O.P. and John McCain's presidential campaign.

NewsTrust Rating: 2.0 average - 4 Reviews » - Review It Visit NewsTrust | About | Sign Up | Disclaimer

Pentagon's Accounting Mess

Sat, 03 May 2008 00:00:00 -0700

Portfolio - By Scott Paltrow - May. 03 (Special Report) - The basic defense budget for 2007 was $439.3 billion, up 48 percent from 2001, excluding the vast additional sums appropriated for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. According to federal regulators and current and former Pentagon officials, the accounting process is so obsolete and error prone that it's virtually impossible to tell where much of this money ends up. While the department's brass has made a few patchwork improvements, billions are still unaccounted for. The problem is so deeply rooted that, 18 years after Congress required major federal agencies to be audited, the Pentagon still can't be. (

NewsTrust Rating: 4.1 average - 7 Reviews » - Review It Visit NewsTrust | About | Sign Up | Disclaimer

Radiohead Figures Out How To Sell 99-cent Song for $4.95 to 2,250 People

Sat, 03 May 2008 00:00:00 -0700

Portfolio - By Kevin Maney - May. 03 (Opinion) - The contest certainly is another interesting experiment by Radiohead in how to sell music in the Internet Age. The band posted five "stems" of the song on iTunes -- one each for bass, drum, guitar, keyboards and voice. Each cost 99 cents. Buy all five and mix them together using music software like Garageband or Cakewalk, and you hear the actual track as Radiohead intended it. Total cost $4.95. But of course, the appeal is that you can then take those stems, add your own effects, other instruments, voices, whatever, mix them all together, and create an entirely new version of the song.

NewsTrust Rating: 3.0 average - 4 Reviews » - Review It Visit NewsTrust | About | Sign Up | Disclaimer

Howell Raines on Rupert Murdoch

Sat, 12 Apr 2008 00:00:00 -0700

Portfolio - By Howell Raines - Apr. 12 (Opinion) - Murdoch allowed that Escapes was all right as an attempt to thwart the Journal's targeting of young professional women, a key readership group for the Times. Then he added some advice about how to conduct a newspaper war: "You ought to hit them where they live," he said of the Journal. "Go after hard business news and beat them on their strength." I can't shake the memory because it seems obvious to me that Murdoch now plans to do to the Times what he was advising me to do to the Journal. He will spend whatever it takes to undermine the Times' standing as America's leading general-interest newspaper.

NewsTrust Rating: 3.7 average - 4 Reviews » - Review It Visit NewsTrust | About | Sign Up | Disclaimer

Murdoch's Role in Yahoo Fight

Sat, 12 Apr 2008 00:00:00 -0700

Portfolio - By Jeff Bercovici - Apr. 12 (Special Report) - ...when Murdoch took control of New York magazine, muscling out founder Clay Felker in a move that drew national attention. Felker, who owned about 10 percent of New York's parent company, considered Murdoch a friend and ally, and appealed to him for help when his board starting leaning on him to improve profits. Recognizing opportunity, Murdoch instead went behind Felker's back and bought up more than half the company's shares. Felker, one of the magazine industry's towering figures, soon resigned.

NewsTrust Rating: 3.7 average - 4 Reviews » - Review It Visit NewsTrust | About | Sign Up | Disclaimer

It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World

Mon, 17 Mar 2008 00:00:00 -0700

Portfolio - By Jesse Eisinger - Mar. 17 (Opinion) - We have reached escape velocity and launched into the No-Consequences Economy. To pause for a moment of overgeneralization: America used to be about exceptionalism and optimism, a place where anybody could try anything and make it work. Across the business and political spectrum, it's now about entitlement, where everyone deserves a shot but no one gets blamed for screwing it up. Stuff happens, as Donald Rumsfeld said, referring to another affair with no consequences for the architects.

NewsTrust Rating: 3.9 average - 3 Reviews » - Review It Visit NewsTrust | About | Sign Up | Disclaimer

Grassroots Support? Or Astroturf?

Wed, 27 Feb 2008 00:00:00 -0800

Portfolio - By Sam Gustin - Feb. 27 (News Report) - Comcast spokeswoman Jennifer Khoury said that the company paid some people to arrive early and hold places in the queue for local Comcast employees who wanted to attend the hearing. Some of those placeholders, however, did more than wait in line: They filled many of the seats at the meeting, according to eyewitnesses. As a result, scores of Comcast critics and other members of the public were denied entry because the room filled up well before the beginning of the hearing.

NewsTrust Rating: 4.1 average - 3 Reviews » - Review It Visit NewsTrust | About | Sign Up | Disclaimer