NY LAW

Ibrahim Machiwala asked:


American Lung Association Report Shows 2007 Shaping Up to be a Banner Year for Tobacco Control Policies.

Mid-Year Update Details Progress to Date in 2007;

7 States Significantly Strengthened Smokefree Air Laws, 8 Raised Tobacco Taxes

New York, NY (July 24, 2007) – In 2007, many states have taken strong action to protect their citizens from tobacco by making public places and workplaces smokefree, raising tobacco taxes, and passing laws to protect citizens from cigarette-caused fires, according to a report released today by the American Lung Association.

In the 2007 Mid-Term Update to its publication State Legislated Actions on Tobacco Issues or SLATI, the Lung Association summarizes state tobacco control laws enacted in 2007 on smokefree air, tobacco taxes, smoking prevention spending and fire-safety standards for cigarettes among other issues.

“In January 2006, the American Lung Association issued its Smokefree Air 2010 Challenge, urging all states to adopt strong smokefree air laws. The 2007 SLATI Mid-Term Report shows significant progress continues to be made. 22 states and the District of Columbia have laws fully protecting their citizens from secondhand smoke. We challenge policymakers in the remaining states to do the same,” said Bernadette A. Toomey, President and CEO of the American Lung Association.

Also in 2007, eight states have increased their cigarette taxes, already matching the total for all of 2006. Forty-three states and the District of Columbia have increased their cigarette tax at least once since 2002. “We are encouraged that states continue to increase tobacco taxes, which makes cigarettes more costly. Higher cigarette prices deter young people from starting to smoke and help motivate adult smokers to quit,” said Toomey.

An increasing number of states have approved legislation setting fire-safety standards for cigarettes. Twelve states have approved this legislation in 2007, and three more states have legislation awaiting action by the governor. “This legislation is vital in the fight to reduce the 700 to 900 deaths annually from fires caused by cigarettes and other smoking materials,” she added.A PDF copy of 2007 SLATI Mid-Term Report is available online. This website is also the home of the online version of SLATI, which is updated on a regular basis to reflect changes in state tobacco control laws throughout the year.

About the American Lung AssociationBeginning our second century, the American Lung Association is the leading organization working to prevent lung disease and promote lung health. Lung disease death rates continue to increase while other leading causes of death have declined. The American Lung Association funds vital research on the causes of and treatments for lung disease. With the generous support of the public, the American Lung Association is “Improving life, one breath at a time.” For more information about the American Lung Association or to support the work it does, call 1-800-LUNG-USA (1-800-586-4872) or log on to www.lungusa.org.



Anna

Adrian Dayton asked:


I stumbled onto Twitter as a marketing tool completely by accident. I was looking for a way to promote a book I’m working on, and a friend suggested that I do two things: Start a blog and get on Twitter.

“What is Twitter? I don’t get how will it help me promote my book to tell people what I am having for breakfast,” I replied. “It would take me too long to explain, just try it out,” he said.

What follows here is a week-by-week review of how I learned that Twitter can be an important business-development tool for lawyers and law firms.

Week 1: Signing up The sign-up at Twitter. com was just like everything else. I needed to add a picture but luckily, I was still holding on to the picture used for my attorney bio, so I uploaded that. A bio. Usually I leave them blank, but this one was limited to 150 characters, so I wrote: “Father, husband, attorney, and aspiring author. Follow me as I work to get published.” I was pretty happy with myself, it was a perfect bio for someone trying to get published. After I finished my profile, Twitter suggested that I start following a bunch of famous people like Ashton Kutcher and Shaquille O’Neal. Was it the real Shaq? Turns out it was. These famous people have almost 80,000 people following them, and the truth is I just didn’t get it.

Week 2: I start following people I needed help finding some publishers to submit my manuscript to, so I used the Twitter search function. I searched using the term “publisher” and turned up about 50 results. So I started following all 50 of them. Some were small publishers, some were big, but the cool part was that they were all posting stories and links all about writing and publishing, one of the articles was “10 Things Every Author Should Do Before Submitting a Manuscript.” This was good stuff, exactly the types of things I needed to learn in my situation. I also realized that, as I started following people, the majority of them followed me back. Now I had more than 30 followers. I was feeling pretty good.

Week 3: A fortuitous connection Some total stranger was asking about my book, this was great. So I explained my book to him, and we chatted back and forth using Twitter’s Direct Messages, which are kind of like an e-mail message or private messages on Facebook. He was an author who has self-published in the past, and he gave me the phone number of one of the gurus of self-publishing. Out of the blue, I call this guy up, and he takes an hour and talks to me. He gives me advice and shares a few contacts with me.

Week 4: Spreading the message When someone shares an interesting link to an article on Twitter or shares a good quote, it gets repeated. This is called a “retweet.” I noticed that whenever I posted articles, they never got retweeted. Why not? Because they weren’t interesting enough. So I started paying attention to the types of articles that were retweeted. Usually they announced breaking news or shared really interesting content on blogs, so I started trying to think of something to post on my blog that might garner some interest. I posted a satirical response to an article one of my buddies from law school posted, and it spread like wildfire, or at least like a small brush fire. I had 170 unique visitors to my blog in just an hour or two in response to that one post. That was fun but, more importantly, it made me realize the power of Twitter. Here I was with fewer than 100 followers, and my message spread well beyond that circle.

Week 5: My first corporate client “Does anybody know an attorney that practices contract law?” “Yeah, that’s actually what I do, what do you need?” I replied suspiciously. “My friend needs some legal advice about a contract, could you talk to her?” “Sure, send me a direct message with her contact into.” After exchanging e-mail addresses and a few phone conversations, my firm had a new client. All our communication was exchanged over the phone and e-mail, and the retainer and payment were paid by credit card. It was so easy, it made me realize that maybe there was more to Twitter than just promoting books. Maybe I could use Twitter to find clients. You see, Twitter functions like a giant cocktail party where thousands of conversations are going on simultaneously. You can listen in on any conversation you please, you just simply need to “follow” the individuals having the conversation. Unlike two other social networking sites, Facebook and Myspace,you don’t need to be accepted as someone’s “friend” to listen in on their conversation. For example, if MC Hammer and Vanilla Ice (both of whom are on Twitter) are having a Twitter conversation, then you may listen in if you have a Twitter account- you can even try to add your own clever enough comment or question to be included in their discussion.

Week 6: Automated searches Using the free program Tweetdeck, I set up searches so that every time someone mentioned “contract law” on Twitter, from anywhere in the world, their post was filtered through a search that arrived instantly on my computer. I soon learned how to create an alert that would send me an e-mail or text message any time the term “contract law” was mentioned in a Twitter post. That allowed me to respond in real time. Return for a second to our cocktail-party analogy. Here you are at this gigantic cocktail party, and you overhear a conversation about contract law. “Excuse me, I couldn’t help but overhear you are looking for a corporate attorney. Could I recommend someone? And like that, a new relationship is created that is specifically targeted. Here are a few of the comments I saw posted on Twitter after setting up my search: “I urgently need an immigration attorney, can anybody recommend one?” “My friend is getting a divorce, can anybody recommend an attorney?” “Does anybody know a NY attorney I can ask a malpractice question to?”

Week 7 and beyond: A world of opportunity I have been on Twitter for 14 weeks. I have a large following now, but more importantly, I have learned some amazing tools that are helping me to expand my zone of influence beyond just Western New York. Every day I see potential leads- some of which I pass on or have to ignore because they are outside of my area of expertise. There are some 12 million users of Twitter now, mostly highly educated people in urban centers, and they are talking about every single legal topic imaginable. My recommendation for any lawyer? You just need to jump in and give it a try.



Raymond

Paul Justice asked:


Medical malpractice may occur more often then you might expect due to the amount errors that have occurred during the past years. Whether it’s because of the lack of qualified doctors, by mere accident, or by a contrived notion the rate of medical malpractice is increasing. Studies have also showed that as the number of Caesarian sections the rate of medical malpractice also has increased. This relation of C-Sections to medical malpractice rates is foreseeable because endure a C-section instead of a vaginal birth is more risky on the mother but less risky on the baby. “When I compared the malpractice rates to cesarean delivery rates prior to 1999, both were declining at a similar rate,” says Dr. Jeffrey Spencer. From 1999 to 2005, however, both were increasing. “I can’t say one led to the other or visa versa,” he says, but he speculates that rising medical malpractice rates are driving up cesarean delivery rates. Medical malpractice insurance rates have been a hot topic for recently then trend of large gaps in increasing rates have been frozen. Bloomberg froze medical malpractice insurance rates because doctors in the New Jersey and New York area were threatening to leave if something was not done.

On the other hand, because the medical malpractice New Jersey rate has been increasing insurance companies have been forking over large settlements to the victims of the medical malpractice New Jersey cases. It is a headed thorn because doctors are unable to pay the hefty insurance rates and the insurance companies cannot afford the large settlements. You would think that the simple answer would be for doctors to just stop committing medical malpractice and everything would settle down. Ending medical malpractice in New Jersey is optimal but in all reality it is something that would take many years to actually occur. The problem is that doctors are being pressured by pharmaceutical companies to sell their expensive drugs to patients that might not even need the drug. The prescriptions of these drugs could even end harming patients if they are being prescribed medication that they don’t need. The pressure from the pharmaceutical companies on the doctors is tremendous, for doctors need to find that extra income to keep up with their medical malpractice New Jersey Insurance. But now that the rates are being frozen, they have no excuse to comply with the pharmaceutical companies ploys.

If you or a loved one has been victim to medical malpractice in New Jersey, contact a lawyer as soon as possible. Medical malpractice cases carry strong time limitations that could possible deny you the ability to file a medical malpractice New Jersey case. It is imperative that you contact another doctor for a second opinion if you think that you have fallen victim to medical malpractice. A medical malpractice New Jersey lawyer has the skills needed to stand up for you in a court of law. It is in your best interest to contact a medical malpractice lawyer as soon as possible for they may be able to gain back compensation that was taken from you.



Clarence

Manu Geol asked:


US Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) is a part of the Department of Homeland Security, and performs some of the functions formerly carried out by the Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS), which was part of the Department of Justice. USCIS was created on March 1, 2003 from what was formerly the Immigration Services Division (ISD) of the INS, which is now abolished.

USCIS does processing of immigrant visa petitions, naturalization petitions and asylum and refugee applications. It also issues employment authorization documents (EAD) and grants lawful permanent resident status (green card), and citizenship to foreigners. It was created by the government to process applications more efficiently and effectively. Besides, improvement efforts have included reducing the backlog of applications, as well as providing customer service through different channels.

Following is the list of 83 USCIS District Offices and Sub-offices nationwide.

Agana, GU; Albany, NY; Albuquerque, NM; Anchorage, AK; Atlanta, GA; Baltimore, MD; Boise, ID; Boston, MA; Buffalo, NY; Casper, WY; Charleston, SC; Charleston,WV; Charlotte Amalie Charlotte, NC; Cherry Hill, NJ; Chicago, IL; Christiansted, VI; Chula Vista, CA; Cincinnati, OH; Cleveland, OH; Columbus, OH; Dallas, TX; Denver, CO; Des Moines, IA; Detroit, MI; Dover, DE; El Paso, TX; Fort Smith, AR; Fresno, CA; Greer, SC; Harlington, TX; Hartford, CN Helena, MT Honolulu, HW Houston, TX; Indianapolis, IN Jacksonville, FL Kansas City, MO Las Vegas, NV Los Angeles, CA; Louisville, KY Manchester, NH Memphis, TN Miami, FL Milwaukee, WI

New Orleans, LO New York City, NY Newark, NJ Norfolk, VA Oklahoma City, OK; Omaha, NE; Orlando, FL Philadelphia, PA Phoenix, AZ Pittsburgh, PA; Portland, ME Portland, OR; Providence, RI Reno, NV Rochester, NY; Sacramento, CA Saint Albans, VT Saint Louis, MO Saint Paul, MN Salt Lake City, UT; San Antonio, TX San Bernardino, CA San Diego, CA San Francisco, CA San Jose, CA; San Juan, PR Santa Ana, CA Seattle, WA Spokane, WA Syracuse, NY; Tampa, FL Tucson, AZ Washington, DC West Palm Beach, FL; Witchita, KS and Yakima, WA.



Paul