The rise of

The rise of the sleepwalking defense. A U. Mass-Amherst student is acquitted of sexual assault after claiming he was sleepwalking through it all. I wonder if that’ll work for Bernie Ebbers and Worldcom or the board of Enron? As a finance person myself, I can tell you that audit meeting have a tendency to lull participants to sleep…

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USA Today reports

USA Today reports on a new trend towards private encouragement of airline service to small communities. Government subsidies didn’t work well because they failed to match the desire for air service with passenger demand for travel, and airlines wound up eating subsidy money and pulling service when the subsidies dried up. Now companies are getting together to decide what kind of air service they need and guaranteeing business up front, reducing the risk to an airline starting service. This private cooperative solution may be the way of the future for luring air service to smaller airports.

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I’m finding that with the

I’m finding that with the increased traffic on the site, I’m getting alot of email questions — what frequent flyer program should I choose? which credit card should I carry? That sort of thing. I’m happy to be of help. Please just understand if it takes me a couple of days to answer. Also, unless you ask otherwise, I might post your question and my answer for others to benefit from.

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The 500 free

The 500 free USAirways offer that I posted has actually shown up in my account twice — so it’s 1000 miles. Even better reason to fill out the form. 🙂

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Free Upgrade Certificates

Free upgrade coupons. Most airlines offer small business incentive programs. The idea is that, by attaching your small business account to the traveler’s reservation, the travel earns both the normal points for the employee and special bonus points for the business. It costs nothing, and can be rewarding. You can earn free travel, upgrades, lounge memberships, etc. AmericaWest even offers an immediate 5% discount on the price of the ticket as well. However, this post isn’t meant to be a discourse on the merits of the different small business programs. I’ll save that for another day. This is a post about how to get something for nothing right away — instant gratification without actually having to travel. When you sign up for AmericaWest’s Corporate AWArds, you’ll get a welcome packet that includes a free space…

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Online shopping

Extra miles for everyday purchases. Most people know about mileage earning credit cards. However, those aren’t the only way to get miles for your purchases. Everyday items can be purchased online. That isn’t news to blog readers. What might be news is that if you start out at a web shopping portal you can earn points for those online purchases. Before buying anything online, you’ll want to go to one of the following portals: Mypoints Milesource (Discounts and free airline tickets) Goldpoints (Miles with any major airline — or Radisson hotel stays for shopping) Clickrewards (American and USAirways miles for shopping) Airmilesmart (Miles with most major airlines for shopping) Worldperks Mall (Northwest airlines miles for shopping) There are very few items you can buy that you can’t get miles for! If you don’t want to…

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