Alcoa Earnings

Hopes that global manufacturing activity is heating up lifted industrial stocks Monday ahead of an earnings report from Alcoa Inc.

The Dow Jones industrial average rose 46 points, while the broader Standard & Poor's 500 index advanced for a sixth straight day. The Nasdaq composite index slipped.

After the closing bell, Alcoa posted revenue that topped expectations, but profits excluding one-time costs fell short of forecasts. The report from the nation's largest aluminum producer gave traders one of the first looks at how companies fared in the final quarter of 2009.

The Alcoa numbers followed a report that China's exports jumped 18 percent in December. The bigger-than-expected increase came after 13 straight months of

Irs Publication 970 - PDF format

The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) announced late last year about an interesting back-to-school feature on its website called “Tax Benefit For Education” or the IRS Publication 970.

This section of the IRS highlights a number of tax breaks intended to help parents and students pay for higher education. This publication explains tax benefits that maybe available to you if you are saving or paying education costs for yourself, or in many cases, another student who is a member of your immediate family. However, most benefits apply only tohigher education.

"Daily Caller" debuts

The folks at The Daily Caller, which launched today, seem to have taken that expression to heart.

Their first lead story is a bit of a bio on Carlos Allen, the so-called "third gate-crasher" at the November State Dinner for India's prime minister. And to draw readers in, Daily Caller is using a photo of Allen that certainly would warm the heart of old, male, city editors.

The website, as The Washington Post's Howard Kurtz writes, is a project of Fox News commentator Tucker Carlson and former Dick Cheney aide Neil Patel and got $3 million in funding from "Wyoming financier Foster Friess, a big-time GOP donor."

But, says Kurtz, "Carlson insists this won't be a right-wing site: 'I don't feel guilty about or ashamed in any way of saying we'll cover the people in power,' he says, dismissing the capital's Republicans as 'totally powerless.' "