Free Republic

(CBS/AP) About 100 cheese-factory workers in the Wisconsin town of Saint Cloud have been celebrating — because they say they're $208 million richer. Wisconsin state lottery officials say no one has officially stepped forward to claim Saturday's Powerball jackpot. But a large contingent of employees from Sargento Cheese say they have the winning ticket locked in a safe. Eric Heimermann is one member of the celebrating group. He told the Fond du Lac Reporter that the mostly second shift workers had chipped in $1 apiece to a pool to purchase lottery tickets. Heimermann, 24, of St. Cloud, spoke with the...

Tehran - Iran expects to earn $60bn from oil exports in its current financial year that ends on March 20, 2007, state television reported on Sunday. "Last year, we earned about $50bn from oil sales. This year this figure will reach more than $60bn," Oil Minister Kazem Vaziri-Hamaneh was quoted as saying. "Iran generally exports between around 2.3 million and 2.4 million barrels per day. But today we have around 2.25 million barrels per day of exports," he said, adding Iran's oil was sold at about $62 per barrel on Saturday. Last Wednesday, Iran said it has raised its oil...

A multibillion dollar tax windfall has eased the strain of California's perennial state budget debate and handed Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger a chance to buy off Democrat and Republican critics as he heads into his re-election campaign. Stock gains, home sales, business profits and taxes on rising gas prices are expected to bring in revenue at least $5 billion above forecasts from just two months ago. The money already has allowed the Schwarzenegger administration to pledge that it will give more to public education and appease the state's teachers union, which has been critical of the governor's spending. "It really helps...

As motorists grumble about gasoline costs hovering around $3 a gallon, a Democratic lawmaker is trying to slap a so-called windfall profits tax on oil companies. Assemblyman Johan Klehs, D-San Leandro, has a bill that would levy a 2 percent surtax on oil company income of more than $10 million a year. It's scheduled to be taken up Monday by the Assembly Revenue and Taxation Committee, which Klehs chairs. The tax would raise $120 million in the fiscal year that begins July 1 and larger amounts in subsequent years, according to estimates by the state Franchise Tax Board. The surtax...

Oil Bashing, Round Two How about a windfall pundit's tax on high TV ratings? Public companies typically advertise higher earnings, but such is the politics of energy in Congress these days that Exxon is blitzing the media with ads playing down its record 2005 profit of $36.1 billion. The last time Big Oil reported earnings, industry executives were paraded before the Senate, grilled about high fuel prices and threatened with special taxes--so the reverse PR blitz is understandable. Of course, Exxon is guilty only of responding to a market need, and its earnings are nothing to apologize for. As a...

Philosopher George Santayana's famous maxim that "Those who ignore history are doomed to repeat it" should be engraved on large slabs of Sierra granite and permanently affixed to the wall of every office in the state Capitol - and quickly, because a much-weakened Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and a reality-oblivious Legislature may replay one of California's worst political blunders. A half-decade ago, as California's dot-com bubble began to burst, those holding stock or stock options in shaky high-tech companies liquidated (or at least the smarter ones did). The state experienced a huge, one-time surge in personal income tax revenues from the...

Expectations of huge financial and medical returns on California's $3 billion investment in stem cell research are unrealistic and based on overblown analysis, according to a study by a panel of research, business and academic professionals. The biggest benefit Californians can expect to reap from their investment – improved quality of life for people living with devastating diseases – is at least 20 years away, the report said. In the meantime, the state should quickly make basic scientific discoveries and tools made with the taxpayers' investment available to the broad scientific community to further stem cell research, the report said....

Although the state's $3 billion stem-cell research institute could help companies such as VistaGen Therapeutics of Burlingame find new cures for a range of health problems, it won't bolster California's coffers the way its backers had promised, a new study has concluded. Many claims supporting last year's passage of Proposition 71, which launched the research effort, ``are based on unrealistic assumptions about the potential economic impact,'' according to the study unveiled Tuesday by the California Council on Science and Technology. ``Some statements about these returns verge on hyperbole.'' The report by the non-profit advisory group, which was created by the...

The tax revenue windfall. For local government officials, it is the major topic of conversation. They are delighted that the hot real-estate market is providing billions of additional dollars to county coffers around the state. For Los Angeles, it represents a cool $1 billion in new revenue, a nearly 10 percent increase over last year. San Bernardino County anticipates its tax receipts to double to about $320 million. However, you'll have to pardon us if we don't join the celebration just yet. The last time we saw government officials so excited was in the late 1990s after Gray Davis took...

SACRAMENTO (AP) - The state's real estate portfolio includes 38 high-value and underutilized properties scattered throughout California that could fetch nearly $1 billion on the open market, according to an administration analysis released Thursday. Another 12 higher-profile properties - such as San Quentin State Prison and fair grounds in Del Mar and Napa County - are worth nearly $4 billion and should also be reviewed for possible sale. The report comes in response to an executive order from Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger issued in May directing state departments and agencies to catalogue property they control, evaluate the need to keep that...

Ruling means schools should get $500,000 annually from trust CELINA - A Collin County judge cracked the books and bank accounts of a secret, century-old private trust Monday, ordering that public officials hold seats on the trust's board and that public schools get a share of $15 million in assets. The Celina Independent School District will be paid about $500,000 now and each year indefinitely, said John Vinson, assistant attorney general in the state's Charitable Trust Section. The A. Hubbard Trust, with only $200,000 in the bank, will almost certainly have to sell its 980 acres of fertile farmland...

NEW YORK - Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry (news - web sites) said Wednesday he would pay for his plan to give a free college education to young students who agree to public service by ending a $13 billion "windfall" that banks earn for making government-backed student loans. Kerry contended that as many as 500,000 young men and women would be lured into public service by his plan, which he said would reinvigorate the nation's commitment to such service. He announced his plan at a roundtable in New York City, saying he was stepping forward with proposals to finance his...

Baylor University player Patrick Dennehy was slain after he decided to expose improprieties in the school's basketball program, says a lawsuit filed here Friday by his biological father. Athletic department officials and university officials not associated directly with the athletic program would not listen to his concerns, the suit said. "Patrick determined it would be up to him to expose the improprieties ... to stop what was going on," said the state district court suit filed by Patrick Dennehy Sr., 44, of Seattle. "Shortly after making that decision, Patrick became the target of violent threats against his person and soon...

The Morant family home is simple: Centered in the rougher St. Clair neighborhood, it's green and white, with siding in need of a little care. On the front lawn, a touch-football dispute rages between kids, while music blares from the house next door. Inside, it's warm, welcoming, even Cosby-like -- sans the expensive sweaters. The living room is accented with miscellaneous Africana in subtle earth tones, and framed wedding pictures of Mark and Stephanie are all around. Other photos are inlaid in wood; a few are of their three daughters, and there's a curious one of a young white woman...

<p>John Little of Portal Software cover is profiled in this 1999 Forbes Special Issue: America's 400 Richest People.</p> <p>The executives and board members of Portal Software have had more success selling their stock than they have running the company.</p> <p>Since Portal of Cupertino went public in May 1999, 21 insiders have cashed in $704 million in stock. During that time, the company has sold only $616.2 million of its billing software and services.</p>

Urban Train-related negotiations between Siemens Transportation Partnership and the Highway Authority have stretched out for a second day. Representatives from both parties have been meeting since Tuesday in the Urban Train's offices in Hato Rey to settle on how much money the government will pay the German company to have the first phase of the train fully operational by September 2003. The government is hoping that a 2003 completion date will help it secure $400 million in federal funds to add new routes to the electric train system. A source close to Siemens said both parties have agreed on $70...