Free Republic

ENTREPRENEUR Jerry Kennelly is investing close to €20 million of his own money in a online e-commerce design and print venture which he hopes will have a million customers this time next year. Headquartered in Killorglin, Co Kerry, Tweak.com went live yesterday and sole shareholder Kennelly describes it as "the most significant global e-commerce application ever created by an Irish enterprise". He won’t divulge how much he has invested in the venture which he has conceived and brought to market other than saying: "We are into double digit millions." Industry sources suggest that the scale of the global operation which...

By Porter Stansberry November 18, 2010 I'd like to make you a business offer. Seriously. This is a real offer. In fact, you really can't turn me down, as you'll come to understand in a moment... Here's the deal. You're going to start a business or expand the one you've got now. It doesn't really matter what you do or what you're going to do. I'll partner with you no matter what business you're in - as long as it's legal. But I can't give you any capital - you have to come up with that on your own. I...

Which do you think is less expensive, not to mention preferable: a cure for cancer, Alzheimer's disease and diabetes, or caring for people with these diseases? Wouldn't it be better medical and public policy to direct more resources toward finding a cure for diseases that cost a lot to treat than to rely on a government insurance program, such as Obamacare, which seeks mainly to help pay the bills for people after they become ill? Isn't the answer obvious? Apparently not to many politicians trapped in an old paradigm that focuses too much on hospitals, doctors and medicines and too...

DUMFRIES, Va. - Tony Vazquez says the years he spent serving as a military police officer at Fort Belvoir prepared him to own his own pizza business. Vazquez and his wife, Shelley, are expected to open their Little Caesars franchise at 16708 Jefferson Davis Highway, Suite 121 in Dumfries on Thursday. “It was the discipline and teamwork I learned in the Army that made a big difference in my life,” he said. “One of the most important things I learned is that when you make a commitment, you stick to it. You must believe in what you are doing.” Tony...

Dreaming of success? Then study failure - because "oops" is the mantra of champions. That was the take-away from FailCon 2010, which brought almost 500 entrepreneurs to San Francisco's Hotel Kabuki to share and compare lessons from the school of hard knocks. "Rather than simply aspire to success, we want to share the actionable steps that can help you avoid failure," said organizer Cass Phillipps, who created the event last year. The daylong show, for which attendees paid from $50 in advance to $330 at the door, combined large panels where noted entrepreneurs discussed their philosophies of failure and smaller...

School choice, lower taxes, job creation: These, and not welfare payments, are what would really help the poor. In his autobiography, former British prime minister Tony Blair recounts the political epiphany that caused him to break with the old-style class-warfare–based Labour Party that he had grown up with. “In a sense they wanted to celebrate the working class,” he writes, “not make them middle class.” In many ways, the Obama administration and congressional Democrats appear to have the same attitude about the American poor. They talk frequently about the poor. They lavish programs upon them. (Last year the Obama administration...

U.S. Embassy sponsors Irish Muslim business conference: Imam calls for Sharia Law in all business dealings" SNIPPET: "There would seem to be a Constitutional issue involved here -- isn't the U.S. Government involving itself in promoting a religion via such a seminar? And what a surprise that that religion would turn out to be Islam. "U.S. Embassy sponsors Irish Muslim business conference: Imam calls for Sharia Law in all business dealings," by Patrick Cooper for IrishCentral.com, October 7 (thanks to Sr. Soph): The U.S. Embassy in Dublin has sponsored a seminar on Muslim entrepreneurs and business in Ireland. A main...

"Sarah Inc." has become a multimillion-dollar business, thanks to some shrewd moves by the former Alaska governor and Tea Party hero. But does that make her an entrepreneur? Our Board of Directors sounds off. When Sarah Palin burst onto the national stage in August 2008, Americans expressed a collective, "Sarah who?" Since then, she's gone on to become a vice presidential nominee, Saturday Night Live spoof, thorn in the side of liberals, bestselling author, Fox News contributor, Tea Party hero, reality TV star and proud mother of a Dancing with the Stars contestant. Today, when it comes to Palin, the...

Regulators on Friday shut down a big community bank based in Chicago that has been known for its social activism but racked by financial troubles in recent months. It was the 114th U.S. bank to fail this year. The Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. took over ShoreBank, with $2.16 billion in assets and $1.54 billion in deposits. Urban Partnership Bank, a new institution comprised of several big Wall Street banks and a private foundation, agreed to assume ShoreBank's deposits and nearly all its assets... In an unusual move, the FDIC allowed some of ShoreBank's executives to continue running the restructured bank......

Both Greece and Rome made significant contributions to Western Civilization. Greek knowledge was ascendant in philosophy, physics, chemistry, medicine, and mathematics for nearly two thousand years. The Romans did not have the Greek temperament for philosophy and science, but they had a genius for law and civil administration. The Romans were also great engineers and builders. They invented concrete, perfected the arch, and constructed roads and bridges that remain in use today. But neither the Greeks nor the Romans had much appreciation for technology. As documented in my book, Science and Technology in World History, Vol. 2, the technological society...

We Americans needed this weekend, with something to celebrate -- our independence from overseas oppressors. Indeed, the Tea Party movement is attempting to recapture the attitude of our nation’s founders toward overweening government, in this case our own. The distance from Washington to Main Street is not as great as that from Boston Harbor to the Palace of Westminster, but it is great indeed. Most Americans want to see spending reined in and taxes cut. But when the manager of a custard stand in Milwaukee suggested to Vice President Joe Biden that he would prefer lower taxes to payment for...

SNIPPET - quote: Obama's Special Envoy to Monitor and Combat Anti-Semitism speaks out against "Islamophobia" If Hannah Rosenthal really wants to end "Islamophobia," here is an easy way. She can call upon Muslims to: 1. Focus their indignation on Muslims committing violent acts in the name of Islam, not on non-Muslims reporting on those acts. 2. Renounce definitively not just "terrorism," but any intention to replace the U.S. Constitution (or the constitutions of any non-Muslim state) with Sharia even by peaceful means. In line with this, clarify what is meant by their condemnations of the killing of innocent people by...

Note: The following text is a quote: http://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/statement-president-national-broadband-plan Home • Briefing Room • Statements & Releases The White House Office of the Press Secretary For Immediate Release March 16, 2010 Statement from the President on the National Broadband Plan America today is on the verge of a broadband-driven Internet era that will unleash innovation, create new jobs and industries, provide consumers with new powerful sources of information, enhance American safety and security, and connect communities in ways that strengthen our democracy. Just as past generations of Americans met the great infrastructure challenges of the day, such as building the Transcontinental...

NOTE The following text is a quote: www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/remarks-president-obama-and-president-medvedev-russia-us-russia-business-summit Home • Briefing Room • Speeches & Remarks The White House Office of the Press Secretary For Immediate Release June 24, 2010 Remarks by President Obama and President Medvedev of Russia at the U.S.-Russia Business Summit U.S. Chamber of Commerce, Washington, D.C. 3:08 P.M. EDT PRESIDENT OBAMA: Well, good afternoon, everybody. It is a pleasure to be here with my friend and partner, President Medvedev, and I want to thank him again for his leadership, especially his vision for an innovative Russia that’s modernizing its economy, including deeper economic ties between our...

n our society of victims, entrepreneurs are blamed for many of the hardships that ail our economy. Whether it is because of high prices, low wages, or substandard economic conditions, they are often accused of exploitation in their quest for profits. The real victims in our economy, however, are usually not workers who voluntarily enter contracts to sell their labor nor consumers who voluntarily purchase products and services but instead entrepreneurs who are involuntarily subjected to the not-so-invisible hand of our government caretakers. Somehow, it seems completely reasonable to overtly exploit entrepreneurs for their resources in the name of preventing...

"Twitterati report: Syria trip mixes work with play" Posted By Josh Rogin Wednesday, June 16, 2010 - 12:26 PM SNIPPET: "The State Department's two leading Twitterati, Special Advisor on Innovation Alec J. Ross (@alecjross) and Policy Planning staffer Jared Cohen (@jaredcohen), are in Syria this week leading a delegation of tech companies hoping to, as the Wall Street Journal's Jay Solomon puts it, "woo President Bashar al-Assad away from his strategic alliance with Iran" with offers of networking equipment, computer software, and the like." SNIPPET: "In between drinking frappuccinos and touring such places as the Souk al-Hamadiye, the famous covered...

Note: The following text is a quote: www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/remarks-president-presidential-summit-entrepreneurship Home • Briefing Room • Speeches & Remarks The White House Office of the Press Secretary For Immediate Release April 26, 2010 Remarks by the President at the Presidential Summit on Entrepreneurship Ronald Reagan Building and International Trade Center Washington, D.C. 6:05 P.M. EDT THE PRESIDENT: Thank you very much. Everybody, please have a seat. Good evening, everyone, and welcome to Washington. In my life, and as President, I have had the great pleasure of visiting many of your countries, and I’ve always been grateful for the warmth and the hospitality that...

WASHINGTON (AFP) – US President Barack Obama laid a key plank of his strategy to mend ties with the Islamic world on Monday hosting a summit to boost economic development in Muslim nations. In a step the White House hopes will help shift relations beyond decades of talk about terrorism and conflict, Obama brought entrepreneurs from 50 countries to Washington for two days to spur economic ties. The president pledged to host the meeting in a landmark speech in Cairo last June, when he also called for a "new beginning" to relations between the United States and the Muslim world....

Obama to beam message to Irish Muslim entrepreneurs 25 April 2010 By John Burke, Public Affairs Correspondent US president Barack Obama will address Irish-Muslim businesspeople and community leaders during a two-day entrepreneurship event this week. Obama’s message on the benefits and opportunities of enterprise will be broadcast over the internet from Washington to a gathering in Dublin of Irish Muslims from the worlds of trade, investments and markets. During the presidential entrepreneurship summit, the president will speak about developing closer links between the Muslim community and providing the capability and funds to develop new business and co-operative networks.