I thought they would have come with some recommendations that actually reduce the burden -- maybe, you'll only have to, say, audit a third of the controls in any given year. Or maybe they would have come with some clarity on what are effective controls, a problem for all-sized companies.

You'll have more missed meetings. But as for SOX or privacy compliance, who cares? I don't see any broad implications.

One of them, there's about 20, will make it through before the 2006 elections.

Projects that were not aligned with compliance and corporate governance were delayed or cancelled, and SOX efforts inhibited the purchase of large amounts of software related to building new technologies and deploying new projects. However, by the second half of 2005, increased interest in IT solutions to ease the burden of compliance has begun to drive new spending.

We knew we had to step up more than usual. I started to feel a rhythm early and I thought it was very big for us to be up (after one quarter).

I thought he was the best quarterback in the state when he was in high school, and I still believe that.