from AARP online

Growing up on the Blackfeet Reservation in northwestern Montana, Elouise Cobell wondered about the government checks that sometimes came—and sometimes didn't. The money was supposed to be paid out to the owners of private lands held in trust for American Indians since 1887 and managed by the Department of the Interior. Yet, though the government leased those lands to timber, mining, and oil companies, the revenue seldom made it back to the lands' owners. "You go to any Indian community and say, 'What's wrong with this picture?' " says Cobell, 61. "These people have oil wells pumping on their land, but they're living in shacks." An accountant and former treasurer for her Blackfeet Nation, Cobell helped found the country's first tribal-owned national bank, the Blackfeet National Bank, in 1987. As early as the 1970s she began lobbying government officials to provide an accounting of the income generated from leased Indian lands and, when no one could give her answers, took the Department of the Interior to court in 1996. The legal battle that ensued has revealed massive fraud of Indian revenues dating back to the 19th century, a legacy that U.S. District Judge Royce Lamberth dubbed "fiscal and governmental irresponsibility in its purest form." That fight continues, but the soft-spoken Cobell—who has been granted warrior status by her tribe—has proved a formidable advocate. "I'm not easily intimidated, and I don't need anyone to do favors for me," she says. "I just want justice—and change." —David Dudley click title for more 2007 Impact Awards

How To Do A Patent Search

You can search the texts or claims of patents for free at the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office (USPTO) at www.uspto.gov. The USPTO's system can search U.S. patents back to 1976 and U.S. patent applications back to March 2001 (when they were first published). You can also use it to make bibliographic searches--for example, to find out the name, title of invention or patent number--of patents from 1790 to the present. You can also easily and quickly download, view and print the images of any patent before 1976. For example, with a broadband Internet service, you can view and print the images of a 10-page patent in less than two minutes! Everything is free on the USPTO's Web site, except for orders of patent copies to be sent by mail. click title for article

Yes, oil from Venezuela

"In spite of the fact that heating oil prices have doubled over the past few years, the federal fuel assistance program faces a one-third cut this year, from $3.1 billion to $2.1 billion. Washington earns windfall tax revenues from the rising prices of petroleum products, but not a cent goes to offset rising energy costs for the poor. Nor do the poor benefit from increased royalties on gas and oil taken from federal lands and waters -- if, in fact, the energy companies pay the government at all." click title for article

Free Wi-Fi Access

Forbes.com is pleased to provide you with this listing of over 11,000 wireless locations across the world, including coffee shops, hotels, restaurants, and airports. This directory is a collaborative effort by thousands of people who love free wireless internet. These businesses are appealing to consumers by providing free wireless internet. Such locations are commonly referred to as "free wi-fi hotspots." click title for article

Last-Minute Inserts Offer Benefits in Medicare Bill

By ROBERT PEAR

Published: December 15, 2006

WASHINGTON, Dec. 14 — By slipping four sentences into a big bill passed last week, Speaker J. Dennis Hastert secured a major change in Medicare policy avidly sought by a few health insurers, in particular a multinational company with headquarters in his home state, Illinois. click title

Word Of The Day

pelagic \puh-LAJ-ik\ adjective : of, relating to, or living or occurring in the open sea : oceanic

Example sentence: "Pelagic birds, seldom seen on land, soar offshore for the eager birder." (William Longgood, _The New York Times_, April 1984)

Did you know? "Pelagic" comes to us from Greek, via Latin. The Greek word "pelagikos" became "pelagicus" in Latin and then "pelagic" in English. ("Pelagikos" is derived from "pelagos," the Greek word for "sea," plus the adjectival suffix "-ikos.") "Pelagic" first showed up in dictionaries in 1656; a definition from that time says that "Pelagick" meant "of the Sea, or that liveth in the Sea." A full 350 years later, writers are still using "pelagic" with the same meaning, albeit less frequently than its more familiar synonym "oceanic."

Share Your Obituary

Here is a little information you've probably not thought about. click title for article

Word Of The Day

Pecksniffian \pek-SNIFF-ee-un\ adjective : unctuously hypocritical : sanctimonious

Example sentence: "His book suffers from excessively long harangues against Pecksniffian prigs and temperance types who, he claims, are still trying to ruin our fun." (Mark D. Fefer, _Seattle Weekly_, January 22, 2003)

Did you know? Seth Pecksniff, a character with a holier-than-thou attitude in Charles Dickens's 1844 novel _Martin Chuzzlewit_, was no angel, though he certainly tried to pass himself off as one. Pecksniff liked to preach morality and brag about his own virtue, but in reality he was a deceptive rascal who would use any means to advance his own selfish interests. It didn't take long for Pecksniff's reputation for canting sanctimoniousness to leave its mark on English; "Pecksniffian" has been used as a synonym of "hypocritical" since 1849.

Word Of The Day

cybrarian \sye-BRAIR-ee-un\ noun : a person whose job is to find, collect, and manage information that is available on the World Wide Web

Example sentence: The library provided an e-mail address to submit inquiries to the cybrarian.

Did you know? We've been using "librarian" for the people who manage libraries since at least the beginning of the 18th century, and the word was used for scribes and copyists even earlier than that. "Cybrarian," on the other hand, is much newer; its earliest documented use is from 1992. "Librarian" combines "library" (itself from "liber," the Latin word for book) and the noun suffix "-an," meaning "one specializing in." When people wanted a word for a person who performed duties similar to those of a librarian by using information from the Internet, they went a step further and combined "cyber-," meaning "of, relating to, or involving computers or a computer network," with "librarian" to produce the new "cybrarian."