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The Club E Network, the entrepreneurs organization founded by Michael Gerber and Peter Burns, is planning to open a business incubator that would provide small-business owners with work space, office equipment, business services and other resources.

The Entrepreneur Factory, or eFactory, would also serve as Club E's headquarters. The organization is currently scoping out potential locations, according to a post on Club E's site.

Club E has expanded significantly since its founding in early 2007. The organization has multiple chapters in the Valley and in Austin, Denver and Washington, D.C.

The chapters meet monthly and are open to students and experienced business owners. 

Even if you pay your credit-card bills and stay within your limits, your card issuer still might change your interest rate or other terms. That's one of the key findings from a new survey of credit cards by Consumers Action (www.consumer-action.org).

The research group asked 22 card issuers whether they could change the interest rate or terms on a card for any reason, and 17 said yes. "Any reason" can include business strategy, market conditions, state of the economy and other factors out of the control of consumers.

Of the 22, five said they might lower a person's credit balance for any reason.

Interest rates ranged widely in the survey - from a low of 6 percent to a high of 22.75 percent (curiously, both were on Wells Fargo cards).

A large majority of cards don't come with annual fees. Of those with fees, the average charge is $43.50.

Consumers Union also identified what it calls the following unsavory credit-card practices:

' Following you down. As you pay off large balances, the credit limit is reduced so that your balance is always near the limit.

' Sorry, you’re over. Credit limits get reduced to levels lower than the current balance, triggering fees and possibly higher interest rates and requiring a “balloon” payment of the over-due amount.

' Where’s my credit limit? Cards are declined at the point of purchase, and only then do cardholders learn their limits have been reduced with no warning.

' Ganging up on consumers. One credit card lowers your credit limit, which lowers your credit score, which causes another card issuer to lower your credit limit and so on.

A new survey down for Move Inc. shows that 44 percent of homebuyers expect the housing market to pick up after a new U.S. president takes office next year.

The survey done by Harris Interactive also found 81 percent of  U.S. homebuyers are still nervous about the market. High home prices are their biggest concern.

But  80 percent of renters still plan to purchase a home during the next five years.

Cathy Humphrey isn't asking for a lot. She wouldn't ask at all but, you see, it's for her daughter.

She wants Maria to have a chance to walk. For that to even be a possibility, she needs $5,000 worth of equipment but the state has turned her down. The reasons why seem to change with every denial but basically, it comes down to this:

State and insurance officials don't think Maria Humphrey will ever walk. So why bother?

Maria is the only child of Cathy and her husband Manny. She was born four years ago with hydrocephalus. Since then, the hits have just kept coming: cerebral palsy, scoliosis, seizures, severe delays in every aspect of her life. Doctors have told them their daughter will be deaf and blind, that she will never be able to eat or walk.

With every blow, the ceiling on Maria's life drops lower. Yet her parents don't easily accept such limits, as parents never should. They believe their daughter can do more, if given a chance.

In fact, she already has.

“We've been told she's going to be blind her whole life, she's going to be deaf her whole life, she'll never drink from a bottle and she'll never walk,” said Andy Humphrey, who works with his niece two days a week. “So far she's disproved three of those and she's working real hard on disproving the walking one.”

For that, though, she will need help.

Last year, the family requested a walker and a stander through Care1st Health Plan Arizona, an insurance company that contracts with the state Division of Developmental Disabilities. Cathy sent in letters from Maria's physical therapist and several doctors, explaining that having the ability to stand could prevent further deterioration of her body, explaining the importance of taking steps and how she will need this equipment if she is ever to walk, explaining that the sooner she is upright, the better.

Care1st turned her down in January, saying among other things that it needs proof the equipment is medically necessary, that there are cheaper alternatives and the real punch to the gut, that “basic care should be tried first.”

This, to a family that has spent virtually every waking moment working with Maria, doing whatever they can to help her reach her full potential, fighting to give her the best life possible.

As any parent of a such a child must fight.

Cathy appealed but in May, DDD upheld the denial.

“Medical necessity…,” it said, “has not been established.”

A DDD spokeswoman couldn't comment on the case, citing privacy. But Liz Barker Alvarez said any review would have been done by doctors and that the agency is focused on helping people to live as independently as possible. “They don't take lightly requests for equipment or sevices or supports or whatever the individual needs to achieve their maximum potential.”

DDD, in its denial letter, did agree to coordinate an evaluation “to determine if Maria has the potential to walk.”

In other words, if it appears she'll never walk, why bother?

Well, you bother because sometimes miracles happen, if you allow for them, and because sometimes kids like Maria amaze us and do more than they should ever be able to do. And because this 4 year old has had enough limits put on her from the day she was born. Do we really want to add more?

Cathy has appealed DDD's decision. She has a hearing on Monday. She can't afford an attorney so it'll be up to go up against the state and its attorney, to explain to a hearing officer what this equipment could mean to her daughter.

“I took a video of her walking with the pt (physical therapist) and she had just the biggest grin on her face,” Cathy said. “You can tell she wants to move and she wants to get around. She wants to be like the other kids.”

Really is that asking so much?

(Column published July 23, 2008, The Arizona Republic) 

A new Rasmussen Poll out today shows Barack Obama and John McCain in a dead heat, with Obama pulling 43 percent of the vote to McCain's 42 percent. When "leaners" are included, each man draws 46 percent.

In other words, it's either man's race to win -- or lose. But is it?

According to the poll, a whopping 49 percent of voters believe that reporters are trying to help Obama score a win this November. This, as the New York Times rejects a McCain op-ed piece that sought to answer an Obama piece that ran last week. This, as the networks work themselves into a frenzy over Obama's trip to the Middle East.

The poll also said that 45% of voters believe that most reporters would hide information if it hurt the candidate they wanted to win.

Not too encouraging for the Fourth Estate, my chosen profession.

Being human, it's impossible not to have biases. Being a journalist, they're not supposed to show. (Unless you're a columnist, in which case you can express opinion.) Yet one out of two voters now apparently believes that reporters, and by extension, editors and producers, are allowing those biases to not only show but to show in a way calculated to swing a close election.

Me? I don't believe it. I've been around journalists my whole life. While it's absolutely true that bias sometimes creeps into coverage (that human thing again), it should be the exception, not the rule. The media has taken a lot of hits in recent years -- some justified -- for letting bias creep into stories or into placement of stories or into whether to cover a story. But a conspiracy?

I guess I'm old school because I still think journalism is a calling and that the paramount tenant of our business -- the continued quest for truth -- is more important than any one candidate or any one election.

Maybe that makes me naive but at least I can sleep at night.

ICE is reporting today that the agency is on track to deport a record 50,000 illegal immigrants from Arizona this year.

With two months still to go in the fiscal year, nearly 39,000 have already been shown the door, up 5,000 from the same period last year. In all, 42,600 illegal immigrants were removed from the country last year by Arizona ICE agents.

ICE spokesman Vinnie Picard attributes the jump in large part to Sheriff Joe Arpaio's jail intake program. "I think it's been a tremendously successful program," he told me.

Last year, the sheriff's office began checking the immgration status of every inmate booked into  the Maricopa County jail. As a result, 14,209 illegal immigrants have been targeted for removal, Picard said.  A similar program in the state Department of Corrections has resulted in another 4,200 targeted  for removal when their prison sentences are up.

I've been critical of Arpaio for swooping into heavily minority neighborhoods looking for illegal immigrants. Such tactics use a ton of manpower to come up with a handful of gardeners and they pose an unfair burden on Hispanics who are here legally.  But Arpaio was right to begin his jail screening program. It not only is fair in that everybody is checked, but it goes after the illegal immigrants we most want to be rid of -- the ones who commit crimes.

By the way, there were no figures available Monday for deportations nationally, but Picard says look for the numbers to be up by the time the year ends on Sept. 30.  In 2005, 178,000 illegal immigrants were sent home. In 2006,  the number was 206,052. and last year, 282,548 were sent packing.

No word on how many of them were sent packing multiple times, given that the border was, is and remains a giant hunk of Swiss cheese.

The proposed rescue of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac makes no sense.

Both companies are mortgage bundlers and investors.

They buy mortgages from other lenders and securitize them. They hold some for investment and sell some to others. They guarantee payments on the mortgage-backed securities they sell to others. And they buy for investment mortgage-backed securities from other bundlers.

Recently, the stock prices for Fannie and Freddie fell precipitously, to roughly a quarter of their previous peak. That represents a sharply revised judgment by investors about the value of Fannie and Freddie's business model and activities.

That's too bad for holders of Fannie and Freddie stock. But in and of itself, it doesn't represent a systemic economic threat warranting the intervention of the federal government.

Other financial institutions do hold mortgage-backed securities guaranteed by Fannie and Freddie. If Fannie and Freddie's financial condition deteriorates to the point of raising questions about their ability to make good on their guarantees, that would reduce the value of securities they have sold to others. And that could reduce the capital of other financial institutions.

But the effect should be minor. The mortgage-backed securities guaranteed by Fannie and Freddie are the good stuff. The mortgagors are all credit worthy and made healthy down payments. The securities are ultimately backed by the properties mortgaged. Even without Fannie or Freddie's guarantee, losses should be minimal.

After all, even including the bad stuff, 92 percent of all mortgages in the United States remain current. Losses in Fannie and Freddie securities are currently running at just a fraction of a percent.

Nevertheless, the Bush administration has proposed that Fannie and Freddie be given an unlimited line of credit from the federal government and that the federal government be permitted to contribute equity if Fannie and Freddie have capital problems. Congress appears likely to go along.

In the meantime, the Fed has agreed to lend to Fannie and Freddie as well.

Instead, Congress should phase out the existing $2.25 billion line of credit each enterprise has with the federal government over a period of, say, five years, and declare that Fannie and Freddie from that point on are on their own.

When Fannie Mae was formed in 1938, there was arguably a role for government to play in creating a secondary market for mortgages. Lending capital was scarce and fewer than half of all Americans lived in their own homes.

Fannie Mae was initially a government agency. It was sold to private investors in 1968, but retained a favored relationship with the federal government. Freddie Mac was formed in 1970, with the same favored relationship, to offer competition and choice.

Such government-sponsored entities are an anachronism today. Over two-thirds of Americans live in their own homes and, in a world of international finance, there is plenty of private sector interest in providing a secondary market for mortgages.

This rescue plan isn't about mitigating today's housing difficulties. Nothing in the plan gets a mortgage paid that wouldn't otherwise be paid.

Nor is the rescue really about today's credit crunch, except for the minor effect a doubt about the reliability of Fannie and Freddie guarantees might have on the capital of other financial institutions.

Instead, it's about enabling Fannie and Freddie to continue to do even more of the same in the future, and that's a bad idea. The rescue plan makes an implicit federal guarantee for Fannie and Freddie explicit. This would give them an even greater competitive advantage, enlarging their already dangerously overlarge presence in the secondary mortgage market.

The Bush administration and Congress are moving toward a much larger federal role in the housing market. Congressional Democrats propose that the federal government refinance some $300 billion in mortgages, while the Bush administration wants to open the federal checking account to Fannie and Freddie and perhaps invest in them.

Meanwhile, the Fed's balance sheet is getting corrupted with junk that others won't buy or lend against.

All this is to keep the housing market propped up at a time in which the market is screaming, about as loudly as it can: THERE'S BEEN AN OVERINVESTMENT IN HOUSING.

What the politicians propose to do about our economic problems has been consistently more troubling than the problems themselves.

(column for 7.23.08)

Part of the problem with foreign policy neoconservatives is that they lose perspective too easily.

Neocons are upset that the Bush administration sent a high-ranking diplomat to the latest meeting with Iran, after saying that it would have such interaction only after Iran suspended uranium enrichment.

I disagree with the isolate-Iran strategy, but there is a certain logic to the neocon complaint. If the strategy is to work, it has to be consistently maintained.

But, according to Michael Rubin, of the American Enterprise Institute writing in the Wall Street Journal, by going to the meeting the Bush administration has enabled Ahmadinejad to campaign for re-election as having "successfully brought  Washington to its knees."

To its knees? Cause we sent a guy to a meeting?

Not every concession is capitulation. And this wasn't even much of a concession.

Gov. Napolitano is looking at moving at least part of state government to a four-day work week.

This may very well be an example of a private sector management technique that just won't work in government.

In the private sector, there's an incentive to make sure that work schedule flexibility doesn't adversely affect worker productivity. If it does, the company will lose out in the competitive marketplace.

There is no such competitive check for government. So, ensuring that fives days of work still gets done in a four-day week requires the kind of management oversight tough to enforce in government.

A cynical libertarian might very well say, so what? Less government output might not be such a bad thing.

In the modern age, however, much of what government does involves giving approval for private sector action. If government bogs down, so does private initiative.

Other than an afternoon thunderstorm, things were pretty quiet as the Cardinals reported to Flagstaff on Wednesday for the start of camp.

Access to many of the players was tight. Receiver Anquan Boldin didn't make himself available, so we'll try to talk to him tomorrow to get his feelings about his contract. Defensive end Darnell Dockett reported and said he's concentrating on football, not his desire for a new deal.

Quarterback Matt Leinart wasn't available to reporters, either.

Three players will start camp on the physically unable to perform list: starting nose tackle Gabe Watson, backup linebacker Monty Beisel and free agent rookie Keilen Dykes, a defensive tackle.

Watson is still recovering from the fractured kneecap suffered in the off-season. He appears to be in great shape, weighing 323 pounds. That's the least he's weighed since his junior year in high school, he said.

He's been running a bit, but he's kept the weight off by either biking, swimming or walking. He walks up to 10 or 12 miles at a time, he said.

Still, it doesn't appear as if Watson will practice in Flagstaff, which has to be a concern. Camp breaks Aug. 21 and the season starts Sept. 7. That's not a lot of time to get ready for the rigors of a 16-game schedule. Backup Alan Branch will be tested.

Beisel had surgery a few weeks ago to correct a back problem. Beisel has struggled with a painful back for weeks, and at one point, even had trouble sitting down. A procedure apparently relieved some pressure on a disc, and it's hoped that Beisel will only miss a few weeks.

Dykes pulled a quad a few weeks ago and shouldn't miss much time.

I hope to bring you more information tomorrow after the conditioning test. It was tough talking to players today because reporters aren't allowed in the players' main parking lot. Players were able to take an alternate entrance to their dorms, avoiding a small group of media types.

I glanced at azcentral.com a few minutes ago as I prepare to head to Flagstaff and saw this story about two golfers being struck by lightning. Seems they were waiting out a storm under a pine tree when lightning struck the tree and went through them.

Officials said the two men were disoriented but knew what their golf scores were at the time they stopped. I figure if there's lightning while I'm at camp, I'm going to stand next to Matt Leinart and Kurt Warner. After all, nothing is allowed to hit the quarterbacks at camp, right?

Anyway, I'm headed up the hill in a bit. I'll blog as much as possible and give you everything from my impressions of practice, anecdotes, random thoughts and maybe an occasional restaurant review.

It should be a good camp for fans. For the first time in four years, the Cardinals open camp during a weekday, giving fans two weekend opportunities to drive up and see them. Pull a little out of that home equity line of credit, gas up and make the trip. Be safe.

 Cardinals GM Rod Graves is supposed to talk tonight to Eugene Parker, the agent for first-round pick Dominique Rodgers-Cromartie. While DRC won't be signed in time to report to camp on Wednesday, Graves remains hopeful the two sides can quickly come to an agreement that would allow DRC to participate Friday in the first practice of training camp.

"We'd like to get down to the nitty-gritty," Graves said. "I don't see this as being a complicated type of contract for us."

Graves has had a difficult time getting together with Parker for substantive conversations. Parker represents four first round picks, and has spent time negotiating those deals.

In other news, Graves said the Cardinals don't have interest in signing running back Mike Bell, recently cut by the Broncos. Bell's agent called the Cardinals to see if they might want to sign the Tolleson High and UofA product.

The Cardinals like Bell and think he's talented, but determined he doesn't have what the club needs at the position: speed. Bell is too much like the backs they already have, so the Cardinals passed.

Cardinals GM Rod Graves said on XTRA-910 this morning that the pace of negotiations with the agent for first-round pick Dominique Rodgers-Cromartie has slowed, and it's question if DRC will be under contract by Wednesday when camp opens.

The pace has slowed, Graves told Dan Bickley and Mike Jurecki,  because DRC's agent, Eugene Parker, has been traveling. Parker has four first-round picks, so his time has been divided among those players, Graves said.

Parker has represented numerous Cardinals first-round picks over the years (Simeon Rice, Andre Wadsworth, Larry Fitzgerald). One Cardinal GM told me that Parker works with his own, private deadline in mind. That's the point in which he becomes serious about negotiations.

Graves is optimistic that a deal could be reached quickly if he and Parker were to continue serious negotiations. Today is somewhat of a soft deadline, because the first practice isn't until Friday morning. While DRC isn't being counted upon to start, it's not like he can afford to miss a lot of time. He comes from Tennessee State, a Division 1-AA school, so he needs all the work he can get against elite receivers.

I talked to coach Ken Whisenhunt this morning for some future stories, and I asked him what he knew of some of his players' medical conditions.

Whisenhunt reserved final judgment until he sees the results of physicals that will be taken Wednesday. But nose tackle Gabe Watson might be the only player not healthy enough to participate when practices in Flagstaff start on Friday. Watson suffered a fractured kneecap in a mishap with a treadmill this off-season, and coaches are hopeful that he'll be healthy enough to take plenty of practice snaps before the season starts.

Whisenhunt wasn't sure about the status of tight end Leonard Pope, who suffered a dislocated ankle and fractured leg in week 14, but he was hopeful that Pope would be ready to go. Strong safety Adrian Wilson, who had heel surgery last year, should be ready to go, but he will be among a group of players whose practice time will be closely monitored.