Quotes from Bill Dedman

Although the number of manufacturing jobs in the United States has stagnated, dropping 12 percent from a high in the early 1980s, the number of retail jobs has risen 43 percent.

Federal agencies that own bridges have some of the worst records for on-time inspections. Nearly 3,000 bridges owned by U.S. government agencies went more than two years between checkups.

I'm not a person who has people tell me things in parking garages.

An investigation by msnbc.com shows that the CDC routinely takes as long as a month - and sometimes as long as nine months - to visit the scene of firefighter deaths.

Many visitors to Chicago know the Loop, the shops on the Magnificent Mile, and the Museum Campus. Meanwhile, much of the bustle is in the developing neighborhoods around the Loop: North, South and West.

Cincinnati attracted its first permanent white settlers by flatboat in 1788. It took its name from the Society of Cincinnati, an organization of Revolutionary officers. That name came from Cincinnatus, the Roman farmer and general.

Wal-Mart has always paid low wages, or, as Sam Walton put it, 'as little as we could get by with at the time.'

Humidity notwithstanding, summer seems to bring out the best of Cincinnati.

Spring and summer in Pittsburgh mean outdoor festivals.

Fans love McGwire for his powerful physique, for his on-field hugs of his son, the part-time bat boy. He is Big Mac, or Paul Bunyan in Cardinals red with a white-ash bat instead of an ax.

'John Doe' is typically used in a warrant when the accused is known by an alias or by a physical description.

I am not one to seek simple causes.

With better gear, firefighters no longer surround and drown a fire - they go in.

Disclosure of private e-mails from government officials has been a legal issue in many states.

The Secret Service once watched for people who fit the popular profile of dangerousness: the lunatic, the loner, the threatener, the hater.

A city built on rivers and bituminous coal, Pittsburgh in the '90s has survived the boom and bust years.

Cincinnatians support a symphony, an opera, a ballet, museums, many galleries and theater groups.

The main threads running through the lives of W. A. Clark and his daughter Huguette include the costs of ambition, the burdens of inherited wealth, the fragility of reputation, the folly of judging someone's life from the outside, and the tension between engaging with the world, with all its risks, and keeping a safe distance from danger.

Many company policies restrict use of E-mail, limit access to offensive Web sites and prohibit disclosure of confidential information. Few policies, if any, directly address personal Web pages.

Polygraphs are not allowed as evidence in most U.S. courts, but they're routinely used in police investigations, and the Defense Department relies heavily on them for security screening.

The Federal Highway Administration has allowed states to take advantage of a loophole in federal regulations, delaying bridge inspections to every four years instead of the two years normally required.

Brand names are well known to business school professors, but only one professor is a brand name herself. Call her Professor Oprah.

Groups that work in black neighborhoods around the country have contended that much of subprime lending is 'predatory lending.'

The Obama administration is fighting to block access to names of visitors to the White House, taking up the Bush administration argument that a president doesn't have to reveal who comes calling to influence policy decisions.