Your daily dose of news and tidbits from the world of money in politics:
O�DONNELL ACCUSED OF PAYING RENT WITH CAMPAIGN FUNDS: Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) has filed complaints with the U.S. Attorney�s Office in Delaware and the Federal Election Commission, asking them to investigate the finances of Tea Party-backed Christine O�Donnell, the Republican U.S. Senate nominee in the First State.
The complaint is outlined in a CREW press release, which states O�Donnell�s former campaign manager, David Keegan, said in a sworn statement that the U.S. Senate candidate paid two months of her rent out of campaign donations in 2009 because she was "out of money." On FEC forms, the expenditures are line-itemized as "expense reimbursements."
The Washington Post talked to O�Donnell, who said the claims are false. She has since said that she is no longer doing national interviews.
In terms of fund-raising, O�Donnell is trailed her Democratic opponent, Chris Coons, as of Aug. 25 -- the date campaign finance reports are last available. Coons has raised upwards of $1.6 million and still has more than $844,000 cash on hand leading up to the election. O�Donnell, through Aug. 25, reported slightly more than $20,000 left from her $376,000 raised.
But unconfirmed reports from the O'Donnell campaign suggest she's raised hundreds of thousands of new dollars since defeating her GOP primary opponent, Rep. Mike Castle (R-Del.), earlier this month. Castle had raised almost $3.5 million and spent $1.5 million of that total by the time of the primary.
GRASSROOTS MOVEMENT GETS BIG SPONSORSHIP: The Tea Party Patriots announced Tuesday a $1 million grant to build local Tea Party groups around the country. The sponsor of the grant remains anonymous, and the funds expire on Election Day, Slate magazine reported.
The funding cannot be used to endorse specific candidates, so organizers say they are still figuring out how to use the money appropriately. Around the country, 2,800 groups are eligible to apply for a grant, which supporters call "fertilizer for the grassroots."
Unlike the big-spending Tea Party Express political action committee (also known as the Our Country Deserves Better PAC) the Patriots, a so-called 501(c)4 organization, focus more on local movements and does not have a PAC of its own, the group�s site shows.
HOW MUCH DID YOUR VOTE COST?: Politics is a game you have to pay to play. However, a new chart by the Washington Post shows that having the most money doesn�t guarantee a "W" in the win-loss column.
The Post has taken the amount of campaign cash major self-funding candidates have raised and divided it by the number of votes they received in the election � essentially generating a number that they call, �dollars per vote.�
An interesting subject is Republican U.S. Senate hopeful, Carly Fiorina of California, who spent $5.5 million up until the primary and received almost a million votes -- giving her the smallest �dollars per vote� spent among candidates studied, with $6 per vote.
Have a news tip or link to pass along? We want to hear from you! E-mail us at press@crp.org.
One of the reasons Aaron Patzer founded personal finance site Mint.com was because of his frustrations with Intuit’s financial management software Quicken. Quicken, says Patzer wasn’t user-friendly, and in Patzer’s own words “felt like a product from 1996.” Flash forward two years, and Patzer’s Mint.com (which was also a TechCrunch50 winner) was bought by Intuit for $170 million in the Fall of 2009. Clearly, Intuit perhaps agreed with Patzer, who is now vice president and general manager of Intuit’s personal finance group, that its own financial products needed a a makeover. Today, Quicken 2011 is debuting its software for Windows that includes more features from Mint.com.
This is the first version of Quicken to reflect the collaboration of the Quicken Desktop and Mint.com product and engineering teams since last fall. The new version for Windows users includes 360-degree financial view that brings together all accounts, including bank, credit card, investment and retirement. Intuit has also added support for 7,000 more banks and now lists 12,000 banks and credit union in the U.S.
Quicken’s new automated engine categorizes transactions (i.e. business, clothes, groceries, etc.) Credit card payments are automatically matched to transfers from checking or savings, to ensure they’re not double-counted. You can also create budgets within the software based on an individual’s historical spending and the software will include expense alerts and a graph to project cash flow help users avoid late fees and penalties. Pricing for Quicken 2011 ranges from $29.99 to $89.99.
Patzer says of the new version: “It combines the best of Quicken with what we built into Mint.com to help ease the burden on people trying to manage their money…The product is customizable and intuitive, two things that people have come to expect from modern software.”
One feature that is clearly lacking between Quicken and Mint is the ability to sync your Quicken desktop software with your Mint.com web account, and integrate the data (Quicken Online users are being merged to Mint.com). But Patzer says that this will soon be added to the suite of products. His goal is for Quicken and Mint to work seamlessly across all platforms, including mobile.
On another note, the Intuit acquisition doesn’t seem to have stunted Mint.com’s growth. Patzer says that the platform has grown from 1.7 million users in September of 2009 to 4.2 million users currently.
BREAKING <b>NEWS</b>: No Jail For Lindsay Lohan - Judge Orders Her To <b>...</b>
http://link.brightcove.com/services/link/bcpid16157557001/bctid645210306001 Lindsay Lohan caught a major break on Friday when Judge Elden Fox chose not to send her to jail and ordered her to stay in rehab at the Betty Ford Center.
Scripting <b>News</b>: The Juan Williams controversy
I always thought he was pretty liberal, but then also shows up on Fox News. When he's on Fox, it's as if he's a different person. Very odd. Permanent link to this item in the archive. He said something on Fox that caused NPR to fire him ...
BBC - BBC Comedy Blog: Impersonating The <b>News</b> Quiz
Funny stuff from the heart of the BBC Comedy Department.
eric seiger eric seiger
Your daily dose of news and tidbits from the world of money in politics:
O�DONNELL ACCUSED OF PAYING RENT WITH CAMPAIGN FUNDS: Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) has filed complaints with the U.S. Attorney�s Office in Delaware and the Federal Election Commission, asking them to investigate the finances of Tea Party-backed Christine O�Donnell, the Republican U.S. Senate nominee in the First State.
The complaint is outlined in a CREW press release, which states O�Donnell�s former campaign manager, David Keegan, said in a sworn statement that the U.S. Senate candidate paid two months of her rent out of campaign donations in 2009 because she was "out of money." On FEC forms, the expenditures are line-itemized as "expense reimbursements."
The Washington Post talked to O�Donnell, who said the claims are false. She has since said that she is no longer doing national interviews.
In terms of fund-raising, O�Donnell is trailed her Democratic opponent, Chris Coons, as of Aug. 25 -- the date campaign finance reports are last available. Coons has raised upwards of $1.6 million and still has more than $844,000 cash on hand leading up to the election. O�Donnell, through Aug. 25, reported slightly more than $20,000 left from her $376,000 raised.
But unconfirmed reports from the O'Donnell campaign suggest she's raised hundreds of thousands of new dollars since defeating her GOP primary opponent, Rep. Mike Castle (R-Del.), earlier this month. Castle had raised almost $3.5 million and spent $1.5 million of that total by the time of the primary.
GRASSROOTS MOVEMENT GETS BIG SPONSORSHIP: The Tea Party Patriots announced Tuesday a $1 million grant to build local Tea Party groups around the country. The sponsor of the grant remains anonymous, and the funds expire on Election Day, Slate magazine reported.
The funding cannot be used to endorse specific candidates, so organizers say they are still figuring out how to use the money appropriately. Around the country, 2,800 groups are eligible to apply for a grant, which supporters call "fertilizer for the grassroots."
Unlike the big-spending Tea Party Express political action committee (also known as the Our Country Deserves Better PAC) the Patriots, a so-called 501(c)4 organization, focus more on local movements and does not have a PAC of its own, the group�s site shows.
HOW MUCH DID YOUR VOTE COST?: Politics is a game you have to pay to play. However, a new chart by the Washington Post shows that having the most money doesn�t guarantee a "W" in the win-loss column.
The Post has taken the amount of campaign cash major self-funding candidates have raised and divided it by the number of votes they received in the election � essentially generating a number that they call, �dollars per vote.�
An interesting subject is Republican U.S. Senate hopeful, Carly Fiorina of California, who spent $5.5 million up until the primary and received almost a million votes -- giving her the smallest �dollars per vote� spent among candidates studied, with $6 per vote.
Have a news tip or link to pass along? We want to hear from you! E-mail us at press@crp.org.
One of the reasons Aaron Patzer founded personal finance site Mint.com was because of his frustrations with Intuit’s financial management software Quicken. Quicken, says Patzer wasn’t user-friendly, and in Patzer’s own words “felt like a product from 1996.” Flash forward two years, and Patzer’s Mint.com (which was also a TechCrunch50 winner) was bought by Intuit for $170 million in the Fall of 2009. Clearly, Intuit perhaps agreed with Patzer, who is now vice president and general manager of Intuit’s personal finance group, that its own financial products needed a a makeover. Today, Quicken 2011 is debuting its software for Windows that includes more features from Mint.com.
This is the first version of Quicken to reflect the collaboration of the Quicken Desktop and Mint.com product and engineering teams since last fall. The new version for Windows users includes 360-degree financial view that brings together all accounts, including bank, credit card, investment and retirement. Intuit has also added support for 7,000 more banks and now lists 12,000 banks and credit union in the U.S.
Quicken’s new automated engine categorizes transactions (i.e. business, clothes, groceries, etc.) Credit card payments are automatically matched to transfers from checking or savings, to ensure they’re not double-counted. You can also create budgets within the software based on an individual’s historical spending and the software will include expense alerts and a graph to project cash flow help users avoid late fees and penalties. Pricing for Quicken 2011 ranges from $29.99 to $89.99.
Patzer says of the new version: “It combines the best of Quicken with what we built into Mint.com to help ease the burden on people trying to manage their money…The product is customizable and intuitive, two things that people have come to expect from modern software.”
One feature that is clearly lacking between Quicken and Mint is the ability to sync your Quicken desktop software with your Mint.com web account, and integrate the data (Quicken Online users are being merged to Mint.com). But Patzer says that this will soon be added to the suite of products. His goal is for Quicken and Mint to work seamlessly across all platforms, including mobile.
On another note, the Intuit acquisition doesn’t seem to have stunted Mint.com’s growth. Patzer says that the platform has grown from 1.7 million users in September of 2009 to 4.2 million users currently.
BREAKING <b>NEWS</b>: No Jail For Lindsay Lohan - Judge Orders Her To <b>...</b>
http://link.brightcove.com/services/link/bcpid16157557001/bctid645210306001 Lindsay Lohan caught a major break on Friday when Judge Elden Fox chose not to send her to jail and ordered her to stay in rehab at the Betty Ford Center.
Scripting <b>News</b>: The Juan Williams controversy
I always thought he was pretty liberal, but then also shows up on Fox News. When he's on Fox, it's as if he's a different person. Very odd. Permanent link to this item in the archive. He said something on Fox that caused NPR to fire him ...
BBC - BBC Comedy Blog: Impersonating The <b>News</b> Quiz
Funny stuff from the heart of the BBC Comedy Department.
eric seiger eric seiger
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