November 2011

Woman Who Allegedly Pepper Sprayed Shoppers Turns Herself In

November 27, 2011

LOS ANGELES — A woman suspected of showering Black Friday shoppers with pepper spray surrendered to authorities but was released pending further investigation after she refused to discuss the incident, police said Saturday. The woman, whose name was not released, is suspected of firing pepper spray into a crowd in order to clear a path to a crate of Xbox video game players that were being unwrapped late Thanksgiving night at a Walmart in the upscale Porter Ranch section of the San Fernando Valley. The suspect got away in the confusion, and it was not known if she bought one of the Xboxes. Ten people suffered minor injuries from the spray and 10 others sustained cuts and bruises in the ensuing chaos. “Last night at 8:30 the suspect involved in the pepper spray incident at the Porter Ranch Walmart turned herself in,” police Sgt. Jose Valle said Saturday. She immediately invoked her right against self-incrimination, however, and refused to discuss the incident further. Police released her pending further investigation. Valle said investigators still have nearly a dozen witnesses to interview, including several spraying victims. He added it would likely be at least two days before an arrest in the case could be made. If the woman who surrendered is indeed the person who sprayed the crowd she could face battery charges. The attack took place about 10:30 p.m., shortly after the Walmart opened its doors for the traditional Black Friday sales that kick off the Christmas shopping season. A crowd of people had gathered to wait for store employees to unwrap the crate of discounted Xboxes. The incident was one of several across the nation that marred this year’s Black Friday. In the most serious case, a robber shot a shopper who refused to give up his purchases outside a Walmart in the San Francisco suburb of San Leandro. The victim was hospitalized in critical but stable condition. San Leandro police said the victim and his family were walking to their car around 1:45 a.m. Friday when they were confronted by a group of men who demanded their shopping items. When the family refused, a fight broke out, and one of the robbers pulled a gun and shot the man, said Sgt. Mike Sobek. ___ Associated Press Writer Terry Tang contributed to this story.

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Janice Harper: An Inconvenient Friend

November 26, 2011

I began to dread the calls. I knew what he wanted: money, help, love. But he’d gotten himself into this mess, I reasoned, and there was nothing I could do. Any money I sent would go to drink, and besides, I didn’t have much myself. I had known my friend for thirty years, back in the day when his eccentricities were charming. He was the Kramer in our group, the wacky wit, the groovy wardrobe straight out of the 1940′s one day, the Renaissance another. He never seemed to have much of a future, but still I imagined when we were old and crotchety, we’d end up rooming together in some old restored Victorian bickering over how high or low to set the thermostat and what to watch on TV. He was an excellent cook. He once got me a job cooking at a classy restaurant in Seattle where it turned out the chef was a con artist who couldn’t grill a cheese sandwich. Those were hysterical days, one mad cap culinary adventure after another, and I marveled at how my friend could work the line, plating a dozen different dishes at precisely the same time with the mastery of a blackjack dealer. He’d never had much to start with. His mother had died when he was a teenager, then his father, then his sister. He dropped out of high school and migrated west to start his new life where coming out as a gay man would be easier. Now the life he’d started was going from promising to promiscuous, just as AIDS hit the scene. How he escaped it, I’ll never know, but his friends weren’t quite so lucky. First one died, then another. His long time partner, the one guy he always came back to, and who always came back to him, died as well and soon my friend was alone. He never made much money, but managed to stay afloat between cooking jobs and the occasional carpentry gig; he was always good with his hands. But as time went on, the world roughed him up a bit. His back began to betray him, leaving him in agonizing pain. Standing all day in the kitchen got to be too much, and heavy labor was eventually out of the question. But still he got by, managing apartments, catering now and then. Small jobs. Short term jobs. No benefits. He’d always had the coziest apartments, filled with his collection of vintage robots, antique tableware and mid-century furnishings. Whenever I needed a place to stay, in between trips to and from Europe or romance, he always had a room to spare, just as long as I didn’t mind sharing it with a naked mannequin or robot. Then housing prices shot up and it got a whole lot harder. The apartment managing gigs became scarce and rents soared way beyond his means. He turned his treasures into rent money until he had less and less and ended up renting a room. Then he took to drinking. I moved away and was gone a long time. Kept in touch now and then, but mostly lost touch. Then a couple of years ago I moved back to the Northwest and saw my friend had grown older. His wavy hair was gray and mostly gone, his skilled hands now shook from drinking. He could still turn out a great meal, on a good day. He had a few under-the-table gigs and was still getting by, but just barely. It had been years since he’d worked a full-time job and just as long since he’d had any health care. His teeth were hurting, and his fingers were numb and tingling, but once he started drinking they were no longer a problem. He could no longer work the line because his timing was shot and now he was just another old guy. Every month he panicked when rent was coming due. When he finally got a job he quit it three days later. Then he moved back east. He had a job waiting for him, he said. When I picked him up to take him to the train station, there he was, standing on the corner with an old busted up suitcase held shut with a bungee cord, a blanket rolled up and tied with some rope. He was wearing a dirty Fedora. He got in the car and smelled like a bum, that foul boozy smell of sweating flesh and nights of hardcore drinking. “Just go,” he said, his voice near tears, “and stop at the liquor store on the way.” I waited outside while he got a pint in a brown paper bag. When I said goodbye at the station, I thought I’d never see him again. I went home, sad and relieved. It was no longer my problem. Then the phone calls came. Things hadn’t worked out as he’d planned. He began to move here and there. It was never clear where he was, if he was safe. I prayed that he was, but that was all. He’d done it to himself. Anything I did would be enabling. “I’m leaving here tomorrow and will be at the bus station on Thursday,” he wrote me in an email. “Can you pick me up and let me stay just one night? I’ll call you when I get there.” Just one night. I was so irritated. How could I say no to just one night, but then what? Why had I ever even answered the calls, I wondered, I had enough to deal with. I couldn’t help him; he’d done this to himself. He needed to get into treatment. I called our old friends, but no one had room. We all felt the same way. But still. Who else did he have to turn to? How could he get into rehab with no money or insurance? I couldn’t shake my annoyance at his return as I went about my day, running errands, shopping. A homeless man downtown asked me for some money. I gave him a dollar, like I usually do. Handing over that dollar, thinking this is going to be my friend, standing on a corner with a cardboard sign, I wondered what kind of friend I really was. It was so much easier for me to sympathize with a total stranger asking for a buck, than the friend I’d known for decades. Was I only sympathetic to people I thought of as blameless victims? Somehow when our own friends hit rock bottom, we can be so unforgiving, abandoning them when they need us most. Helping them would be enabling. Just being there would be inconvenient. I met him at the bus station, and brought him home to a good dinner with some old friends. We gave him a cell phone and gift certificates for some decent clothes. We had a list of shelters and resources for the homeless. I let him stay one night, then dropped him off to his new life. He joined us for Thanksgiving. He’d sobered up, but who knows for how long. He wasn’t shaking anymore, the color had returned to his face and he was laughing. He’d made a new buddy in the shelter, but he couldn’t go back for a week. By leaving for a Thanksgiving meal and a shower he’d lost his spot for seven days. He wasn’t worried. He had a list of other shelters. I’d watched him over the years go slowly homeless. And the more his needs grew desperate, the more I and others pulled away. He’d done it to himself, there was no denying. And the world had done it to him, through a housing market and health care system that sure didn’t make it easy. None of us could have stopped his descent. But being there for him when he was falling, when he needed his friends more than ever, well that wasn’t comfortable. “Avoid people who bring you down,” the self-help books advise. “Associate with successful people,” we are told. And give generously to the poor. As long as we don’t know them. I know my friend, and that’s what makes his downfall so unpleasant. It rubs off on me, annoys me. But sometimes the biggest difference we can make is not in the lives of strangers who are less fortunate, but in the unfortunate lives of those we do know. It’s never convenient, but who ever said that friendship always would be?

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Roger I. Abrams: The Triumph of Collective Bargaining

November 26, 2011

This has been quite a week in the business of sports. Club owners in baseball and basketball have settled their labor disputes with the unions representing their players through the arduous process of collective bargaining. While the parties in baseball were expected to reach an agreement, their history of failed negotiations makes that an uncertain proposition each time a collective bargaining agreement expires. The parties in basketball have been through a painful set of negotiations, and, in one last attempt to save their season, they reached a tentative pact. Collective bargaining is a frustrating experience both for the participants and the fans of sports. I am sure there are days when club owners wish — as many employers do — that their employees would just toss out the union and come back to work at the generous salaries the clubs offer. Many of these owners made their riches running non-union businesses and enjoyed a full measure of managerial discretion. In team sports, however, the owners need the unions. Unless embodied in a collective bargaining agreement, many of the rules needed to operate a team sport would constitute antitrust violations, something the owners must avoid. The NBA negotiations demonstrated how complicated bargaining can be when you have dozens of owners on one side of the table. The owners’ interests were not congruent. Some wanted a “big win” over the union which would then allow them to market their franchises at a better price. Others just wanted to play the game. Each game missed meant a significant loss of revenue. It was David Stern’s job to try to cobble together a majority out of this mix, not an easy task. The NBA players also have divergent interests. Players with high salaries and long-term contracts do not share the concerns of marginal players on ten-day contracts. The Players Association seemed to be able to bridge these differences until it needed to call the NBA’s bluff and move towards decertification and antitrust litigation. By comparison, the pros at the bargaining table in baseball — Mike Weiner for the Union and Rob Manfred for management — now have hammered out their third contract in a row without a work stoppage. They have moved towards “partnership bargaining.” That does not mean that negotiations are quick and easy. They deal with difficult issues, but the parties do so quietly, without public posturing, and in full recognition of the legitimate, albeit conflicting, interests of the folks across the table. Anyone who thought that baseball would enter an “Era of Good Feelings” after the 1994-95 debacle either had remarkable foresight, or was just nuts. The negotiators in baseball have made their enterprise more interesting through the bargaining process. We don’t know the details of the money and revenue sharing provisions, but adding an additional wild card qualifier in each league is good news for the fans. This gives more teams at least the glimmer of hope of making it to the post-season, while, at the same time, makes winning a division more meaningful since the wild cards now only get a single-game guarantee. I am sure many will be hoping for a repeat of the excitement generated by Bobby Thomson’s dramatic walk-off home run in the Giants-Dodgers one-game playoff in 1951. The basketball negotiation once again demonstrated the importance of personalities at the bargaining table. Negotiating is a very human process, and the word is that management negotiators had problems dealing with Jeffrey Kessler. Jeff is a terrific union-side lawyer, perhaps the most important strategist on the players’ side in professional sports. For whatever reason, the NBA trade association (or whatever it was called during its brief lifespan) found it advantageous to bring in new counsel to make the deal. That is not unusual in collective bargaining. It was also quite foreseeable that the bargain would ultimately be reached at 3 a.m. Negotiators are people too. They get tired, and these long, drawn-out negotiations were exhausting. As a labor arbitrator, I often see the product of these 3 a.m. bargaining sessions years later when a dispute arises about what the parties actually intended when they reached their deal. They write things down, but are too tired to dot every “i” and cross every “t.” This leaves some work for arbitrators to do, filing in the gaps left by the negotiators. Much to just about everyone’s surprise, all three negotiations this year — NFL, NBA and MLB — ended successfully in agreements. The NFL and MLB missed no meaningful games, and the NBA will be everyone’s all-day-long Christmas present. There was lots of frustration along the way, but the deals were made. We now have almost a year until the National Hockey League collective bargaining agreement expires, and so there is no need to worry, at least not yet.

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Exhausted Target Worker Drives Into Canal After All-Night Shift

November 26, 2011

A 36-year-old Target employee drove her car into a 20-foot deep canal after working the night shift on Black Friday. Florida police said the woman lost control of her vehicle due to exhaustion, reports Miami New Times . The woman is unable to swim, but managed to call police from her cell phone and explain the situation as she and the car began to sink, notes NBC Miami . Palm Beach County sheriff’s deputy Frank Mayo dove into the canal to save the unidentified woman, reports The Palm Beach Post . “Our thoughts are with the team member and her family for a speedy recovery,” Jessica Carlson, a Target spokeswoman told the Palm Beach Post . The car accident comes after a slew of retailers, including Target, made the decision to open at 12 a.m. on November 25 to accomodate Black Friday shoppers. This required employees to arrive at 11 p.m. on Thanksgiving to prepare the store for an influx of shoppers. Target said the decision to open earlier on Black Friday was popular with both employees and customers. But at least one Target employee wasn’t enthusiastic. Anthony Hardwick started up a petition on Change.org asking for reasonable working hours over Thanksgiving, reports The New York Times . Though Target never changed its opening hours, the petition went viral and received over 100,000 comments from across the country.

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PHOTOS: Artist Takes The Occupy Movement Underwater

November 26, 2011

First New York, then other cities around the world. Now the Occupy movement has spread underwater and it doesn’t even involve humans. Taiwanese artist Vincent J.F. Huang has created an installation that uses marine animals to examine the burgeoning protest movement. “The Atlantis Project,” which is on exhibit at Artspace in Sydney, Australia, features a number of marine animals “occupying” models of famous world landmarks. Through the course of the exhibit, the aquarium’s coral will continue to grow “until the life-sustaining resources of the aquarium are fully consumed,” and the coral loses its pigment . The aquarium and the life it contains are a microcosm, according to a press release. “The project metaphorically represents the limitations of earth’s resources.” The project’s connection to the occupy movement is also explained: Outrageous affairs are occurring and infuriated marine creatures are occupying icons of human civilization underwater. The spectacles of corruption and aberration in modern Atlantis are exposed! Art imitates life and Occupy Wall Street in other ways beyond this project as well. ARTINFO’s Ann Binlot observed parallels between the current movement and Philip Glass’ opera “Satyagraha,” about Mahatma Gandhi. Earlier this month, an Occupy Wall Street committee reached out to artist Mark di Suvero , whose sculpture “Joie de Vivre” is located in New York’s Zucotti Park. View photos of The Atlantis Project installation below, courtesy of Vincent J.F. Huang: —

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Rick Tumlinson: Mars Science Laboratory — Product vs. Process

November 26, 2011

Dear Mars Science Laboratory team, Thank you! In the middle of a completely absurd debate about how much U.S. taxpayer money should be put into the pockets of congressional donors in the name of not building government rockets that will not support the opening of space in any way, you are going exploring. How crazy is that? It’s hard to get my head around the idea that you are in the same space program as the people who are willing to kill our exploration and opening of space in the name of control, constituency and, of course, cash. Indeed, it has often seemed over the years that there are two government space programs. One, like you, is bold and experimental in its style and approach — and yet building on its legacy to push outwards the boundaries of the known and drive back the edges of the frontier in science, knowledge and technology. Each step forward is into unknown territory, often simply guided by best guesses. This sometimes leads to higher costs and yes, even delays, but in the end there is always forward and outward motion. This is what the Mars Science Laboratory (MSL) represents. Experimental, explorational science. Learning about Mars as a new world. Discovering new things that will tell us about the history of our solar system, help reveal the secrets of life and continue blazing the trail that may someday be traveled by the rest of us. You are NASA as Lewis and Clark or James Cook, and you make me proud. And like our commercial sector, you give me and the millions of other Americans who are paying for this something for our money. You give us a product. New worlds explored, new knowledge, new technologies, and oh yes, you inspire us — clear payback for our national investment — usually by doing things that would not happen any other way. Yes, some of your technologies spin off into our economy along the way as a bonus. And that is fine with me. I want you to go do science, go do exploration. It isn’t always about making money or directly enabling the private sector with every step of every project; that’s why this is a partnership. Yet even in that area you guys are doing things right. For example, your MSL is flying to Mars on a commercial rocket. Having decided on your mission — i.e., what you wanted to accomplish at your destination — you hired a commercial launch provider to get you there. You didn’t have to design the rocket; you bought the ride. The product drove the process, not the other way around. This stands in stark contrast with how some others in our space program operate, where process not only drives but exists independent of any specified product or goal. In fact, process and its profits are the goal. Those others don’t seem to care what I get for my tax money; they just want to be in control of a process, and the goal be dammed. They are focused on process rather than product and systems rather than success. Unfortunately, without clear goals, the process becomes a performance, easily subverted by those having no interest in achieving anything but their own short-term gain. They aren’t doing this for science and exploration, but for show and exploitation. They are doing theater. They are mouthing scripts and performing intricate dances invoking exploration, but they are doing nothing but selling tickets to a show about putting on a show. You, on the other hand, are the real deal. You may not be as efficient as our private sector, but you are doing something real, taking real risks, and staying focused on the product, not the process or the production. MSL will fly to Mars. It may or may not succeed in its goals, but at least it has goals, and they are goals based on American values and ideals. Your agency is about to face a budget cut that is deeper than anything since it was created. I want you to be able to keep on exploring. When it comes to the fat-cutting that lies ahead, We are going to fight to make sure it is the process and the pork it creates that are removed, not the product. You will have to tighten your belts, to be sure, but know those who are wrapping themselves in your sailcloth are not your friends. They do not care if you ever voyage again. These others will fail in their attempts to subvert our space program to their ends; the question is how much they will waste that could be spent exploring before they do. We who fight to turn space into a new economic frontier need you. You and your friends who want to return to the Moon, and those who want to develop the tools to make sure we can go to both places and anywhere else and not just stay but prosper, are our trailblazers. You are the ones who can work on things we can’t yet afford to work on. You are the ones who can go out there and tell us what you find. You are the ones who keep the fire of imagination lit. You make the government side of the multibillion-dollar investment we call our space program worth it. And you need us. If we can develop low-cost commercial access to space you will be able to explore and do more science than has ever been done before. For every monster government rocket that doesn’t fly, we will fly dozens, and you will be able to buy those rides for pennies on the dollar. For every meddlesome minuet of control we don’t have to dance on the stage of process, our costs will drop, our efficiency will increase, your opportunities will rise and the return on our taxpayer investment in you will soar. In the meantime, we will build and drive the trucks and ships, we will follow the trails you blaze, and we will turn what you find in those places you explore into new places for Americans to create wealth and homes. This is a partnership, based on exploration and enterprise. Those who would gut your budgets to do what we can do better for you are not your friends. We are. Science and business are based on product. We deliver you to the destination, you deliver the data. Simple, elegant. A marriage to make the heavens ours. I and the millions of others who are giving you our money and trust offer you our support and look forward to what is coming next. We want to see the results of life tests and feel the power of human life as we look through the helmet camera of the first woman to peer over the edge of the Valles Marineris. We want you to light the imaginations of new generations, while we will give them the chance to build lives, careers and fortunes in this amazing field and eventually follow you to the edge of the known. As I have said before, you just keep on exploring, and leave the driving to us. I salute you, MSL team, and wish you Godspeed.

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O’Hare Offers New Weekly Direct Flight To Cuba

November 26, 2011

The Chicago Department of Aviation announced that the O’Hare International Airport on Friday began offering a weekly, nonstop charter flight between Chicago and Havana, Cuba. Every Friday, the flight will leave for Havana from O’Hare and an additional flight will arrive from Cuba each week , according to an AP report. The airport is one of eight airports cleared earlier this year to offer flights to Cuba. Flights to Cuba were previously restricted to only Miami, New York and Los Angeles. According to the Chicago Sun-Times , C&T is slated to add an extra flight on Mondays starting on Jan. 9 . Mayor Rahm Emanuel said the new flight to Havana “demonstrates our city’s competitiveness in the global marketplace and it furthers our mission to provide direct connections to Chicago from all around the world” in a statement reported by the Sun-Times.

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Twitter Reacts to Small Business Saturday

November 26, 2011

Black Friday may be America’s biggest shopping day of the year, but Small Business Saturday is also gaining momentum among the masses. In its second year running, the Small Business Saturday’s Official Facebook page attracted over 2.6 million likes, up from 1.2 million in 2010 . Nestled between Black Friday and Cyber Monday , Small Business Saturday is the day on which American Express offers its card members a $25 credit for any $25 or more spent at qualifying small businesses nationwide. The shop small movement received an extra boost thanks to Occupy Wall Street’s outrage over Black Friday , calling for consumers to boycott chain stores in favor of shopping at small business owned stores. In addition to forming Occupy Black Friday and Don’t Occupy Walmart , several OWS chapters also organized protesters across the country the day after Thanksgiving . In honor of Small Business Saturday, click through the slideshow to see the latest tweets in support of local business.

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FBI Nabs Suspected AT&T Hackers

November 26, 2011

Philippine police and the FBI have arrested four people that Manila said were paid by a militant Saudi Arabian-based group to hack into U.S. telecom AT&T’s system, but the company said it was neither targeted nor breached.

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Obama Takes His Daughters Shopping

November 26, 2011

WASHINGTON — President Barack Obama has pitched in to help small businesses get into the holiday shopping season. The president took his daughters, Malia and Sasha, along on a shopping run to a bookstore a few blocks from the White House. He says he made the visit because it’s “small business Saturday” and he wanted to support a small business. The retail industry is encouraging shoppers to patronize mom-and-pop businesses on the Saturday after Thanksgiving. It’s a counterpoint to Black Friday and the sales and special deals offered by department stores and other large retailers. The Obamas walked out with a selection of books including “The Invention of Hugo Cabret,” “Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Cabin Fever” and “Descent into Chaos: The U.S. and the Disaster in Pakistan, Afghanistan, and Central Asia.”

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Over 100 Sites Hit In Massive Piracy Crackdown

November 26, 2011

US authorities have initiated the largest round of domain name seizures yet as part of their continued crackdown on counterfeit and piracy-related websites. With just a few days to go until “Cyber Monday” more than 100 domain names have been taken over by the feds to protect the commercial interests of US companies.

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Chicago Exchanges: Tax Breaks Needed To Stay Put

November 26, 2011

CHICAGO — John Schneider’s work is all shouts and hand gestures. Get him on the phone and you’ll strain to hear over the barks and cries of his fellow commodities traders in the corn pit at the Chicago Board of Trade. The board’s art deco building has long been an icon, and Schneider compared it at its founding in 1848 to a business like Groupon Inc. today – operating on the economic frontier and pushing Chicago toward its future. Even as the shouts and gestures gave way to the bits and bytes of modern electronic trading, the Board of Trade and the city’s other exchanges had a strong hand in making Chicago the financial center it’s become. But two exchanges, the CME Group Inc., which owns the Board of Trade and the Chicago Mercantile Exchange, and CBOE Holdings Inc., have threatened to leave the state unless they’re given significant tax breaks to make staying worth their while. They say a big tax increase enacted this year and what they say are inequalities in the tax code have forced them to pay an outsize share of the state’s corporate income taxes. Lawmakers are returning to Springfield on Tuesday to consider special deals to cut the exchanges’ tax bills, and the price tag for the financially-strapped state could reach well into the hundreds of millions of dollars. They must decide whether Illinois, where the unemployment rate is just over 10 percent, can afford to give in to exchanges that may no longer need Chicago as much as it needs them, or whether to take their chances that the companies will stay put without new deals. While some question whether the exchanges would really move, in Schneider’s mind, not trying to accommodate them would send a signal that Illinois is no longer the kind of place where the exchanges were born. “If you can’t hold onto a 150-year-old institution, then what’s next?” asked Schneider, who works for League Trading. “Would stuff like this stifle companies like Groupon from starting?” The exchanges are just two of the major Illinois-based businesses that have threatened to walk away from the state this year, demanding tax breaks and other perks. The legislative package also includes breaks for Sears Holding Corp., which has warned of moving its headquarters out of the Chicago suburbs. The exchanges say it’s unfair for the state to tax their trades as if they all happen in Illinois, when the buyers and sellers in electronic trades are often somewhere else. CME Group says it pays close to six percent of all corporate income taxes in the state. It doesn’t provide a dollar figure, but the state collected a total of $1.67 billion in 2010; six percent of that would be about $100 million. The proposed tax package “reflects the global nature of the financial markets and puts the exchanges on more equal footing with other Illinois companies and other U.S. exchanges,” CME chief financial officer Jamie Parisi testified at a hearing in Springfield. Neither CME nor CBOE would comment directly for this story. CME employs about 2,000 people in Chicago while CBOE has about 500 workers in the city. The companies are pressuring a vulnerable state. Illinois raised its corporate tax rate in January from 4.8 percent to 7 percent to help deal with a massive budget deficit. That multi-billion dollar means Illinois can’t afford to cut any company a break, University of Illinois economist Fred Giertz said, but the tax increase leaves the politicians in a bad position to make a stand. “I think people who voted for the tax increase also want to not be blamed for having these services and industries leave the state,” Giertz said. “You have to stand up at some point (and say no), but it’s not easy to do that.” It isn’t clear whether the exchanges would really leave. Moving is expensive and disruptive and experts say companies often threaten to pack up for a new location with little intention of doing so, just to force government to come through with deals to keep them in place. A spokesman for a union that represents thousands of government workers in Illinois said the companies are taking advantage of Illinois, and that lawmakers should find other solutions. “Rather than holding taxpayers over a barrel and demanding giveaways for themselves, responsible employers that feel they are taxed inordinately should blame the two-thirds of Illinois corporations that pay no state income taxes at all,” said Anders Lindall, a spokesman for the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, referring to a figure often cited by some of the biggest backers of the tax breaks, including state Sen. President John Cullerton. But if any businesses could easily relocate, it might be the exchanges. Their electronic trades could be conducted almost anywhere. There are no assembly lines to move, no raw materials they need to be near. “You can process orders virtually any place,” Giertz said. Indiana reportedly has extended an offer to the CME Group, hoping to lure it away. Officials with the CBOE – a smaller exchange that says it paid $13.7 million in state taxes in 2010 – have said they’ve talked to several states. Legislators are still working on the tax break package, but last week the governor’s office put the cost to the state on one version at $850 million a year, starting three years after passage. The package has grown to include provisions for Sears, low-income taxpayers and others to broaden support for it. The Board of Trade was founded in 1848, the same year the Illinois and Michigan Canal opened, linking the Chicago River and Lake Michigan with the Mississippi river. The farms to the west flooded the city with crops and livestock destined for the East Coast and beyond, and the exchange smoothed the buying and selling through futures contracts that allow commodity prices to be locked in in advance, avoiding price swings. Along with that trade, the city quickly grew, from about 30,000 people to roughly 300,000 in two decades. “The Board of Trade became the commodities trading center of the world, basically,” said Carl Smith, a professor of American Studies at Northwestern University. The Mercantile Exchange began in 1898 as a Board of Trade spinoff, the Chicago Butter and Egg Board. Similarly, the Board of Trade opened the Chicago Board Options Exchange, or CBOE, for the trading of stock options in 1973. The exchanges mean jobs in Chicago, with the area around the Board of Trade full of financial firms and restaurants that cater to the traders. But there’s also a symbolic and psychological aspect to the exchanges having called Chicago home for so long. “CME’s position is that, given the choice, it would prefer to stay in Illinois,” said John Carpenter, senior vice president of the Chicagoland Chamber of Commerce. “Chicago is a great place to do business for them.” ___ Associated Press writer Tammy Webber contributed to this report.

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Bank Of New York Mellon Backs Off From Its Plans For Deposit Fee

November 26, 2011

(JED HOROWITZ, Reuters) – Bank of New York Mellon Corp, which was derided for a plan to charge some of its large corporate and investment management clients for holding their deposits, appears to have flinched. The bank has not assessed a penny since warning clients about the possible deposit fee in early August, officials told Reuters, although it remains burdened by cash that it cannot profitably redeploy at rock-bottom interest rates. The fee of 0.13 percent was to have taken effect on August 8 for accounts with more than $50 million that had soared well above their monthly averages as clients fled short-term investments for the safety of U.S. banks. “My guess is that the backlash was pretty stringent and they decided not to do it,” said William Gerber, chief financial officer of TD Ameritrade Holding Corp, a cash-management client of Bank of New York. “I can see their problem but I’m not that empathetic considering all the fees we’ve been waiving.” He was referring to hundreds of millions of dollars of money-market mutual fund fees that financial companies have waived over the past two years lest investors realize negative returns on their fund holdings. Unlike Bank of America, which was shamed into withdrawing a plan to charge its customers $5 for debit card transactions after a torrent of articles ridiculing the proposal, Bank of New York said that its super-sized version of its deposit fee is not dead. “We haven’t charged any clients to date, and the policy remains in place as markets remain unsettled and interest rates remain at historic lows,” BNY Mellon spokesman Ron Sommer wrote in an email. The fee, he added, was aimed at “a small number of clients with extraordinarily high and volatile deposit levels.” In its August letter, the bank urged clients to consider cash investment options “to minimize any effect” of the mooted fee. ANXIETY DROVE DEPOSITS The plan was prompted by a flood of deposits from companies, money-market funds and other clients fleeing short-term investments that exposed them in late July to the then-unfolding Greek financial crisis and from U.S. government securities amid a Congressional impasse over raising the U.S. debt ceiling. A source said Bank of New York’s deposits swelled about 39 percent in a period of two weeks in late July and early August to about $250 billion, underscoring the fragility of the global financial system at any sign of panic and creating balance-sheet management challenges for the bank. At the end of September, deposits were 45 percent higher than a year earlier, Chief Financial Officer Todd Gibbons said in discussing third-quarter earnings, though he said the influx had stabilized since earlier in the quarter. Sommer declined to discuss the deposit levels. Bank of New York continues to attract a heavy flow of cash since it has higher ratings from Moody’s Investor Services than trust bank competitors such as State Street Corp and Northern Trust Corp, another official said. Those banks did not match Bank of New York’s deposit fee announcement, although some commercial banks with larger lending businesses that fund loans with deposits have been passing FDIC fees to some of their small-business customers. The policy was initiated under former Bank of New York Chief Executive Robert Kelly, who was ousted in early September and replaced by Gerald Hassell, a 30-plus-year veteran of Bank of New York who some insiders said was more sensitive to client relationships. Kelly took the top role when the New York bank combined in 2007 with Pittsburgh-based Mellon Financial Corp, which he led. “I believe they are backing away from the strategy, Gerard Cassidy, an analyst at RBC Capital Markets, wrote in an email. “Not certain if it is customer backlash or a rethinking of strategy under new CEO.” Custody banks make most of their money from holding securities and other assets for clients worldwide and ensuring that they are properly accounted for and exchanged when clients demand. Bank of New York swapped its 338 retail branches and small business banking businesses in 2006 for JPMorgan Chase & Co’s corporate trust business and $150 million in cash. The deal helped Bank of New York avoid some of the credit problems that continue to depress earnings of more traditional banks, but deprives it of the ability to negotiate on loans and other businesses in return for winning custody activities. Because rates are so low, many custody banks today are less eager to attract new business or are more aggressive about insisting that clients offset the low-return deposit business by using other services, said Anthony Carfang, head of Treasury Strategies, a Chicago-based consulting firm. (Reporting by Jed Horowitz; Editing by Tim Dobbyn) Copyright 2011 Thomson Reuters. Click for Restrictions .

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Overworked, Older Americans Not Using Up Allotted Vacation Days

November 26, 2011

NEW YORK — By year’s end, the average American worker will have accumulated more than a week’s worth of unused vacation days . According to a recent American Travel Behavior Survey, commissioned by the discount travel website Hotwire.com, older Americans tend to have a disproportionate share of unused vacation time. In particular, for workers ages 55 and older, the survey found that nearly 30 percent have between five and 10 vacation days left over at the end of each year. Further, it found that only a quarter of workers 55 and older had used up all of their allotted vacation time by year’s end. “Too many Americans are getting caught up in their everyday routine and are either forgetting to use their vacation or assuming travel for the remainder of the year is too expensive,” said Clem Bason, president of the Hotwire Group, in a statement. In terms of claiming unused vacation time, Bason cited the first two weeks of December as a generally more affordable and cost-effective time to book hotel and airline reservations, since it’s just before the crush of holiday travel. While Manny Avramidis, senior vice president of global human resources at the American Management Association, sees older workers as generally having amassed more vacation time than their younger counterparts, he said the general unwillingness to claim unused vacation time is based on fears related to the economy. “For some people, when they’re present and working, they think they’re showing their boss their value,” Avramidis said. “They fear that when they’re on vacation, their manager will see that the company not only does fine without them, but that they might eliminate their position as a result.” Even still, he cited some organizations where managers are tasked with ensuring that workers take an appropriate amount of time away from the office — be it a long weekend or a two-week jaunt abroad. Forgoing vacation time is not without its own danger. Overworked employees are particularly prone to burn out and can eventually lack the ability to balance their work responsibilities with the other demands of their busy lives. Christiane Turnheim, a life and career coach, strongly encouraged workers of all ages to use unclaimed vacation days — despite the near-constant demands of work. “You’re only considered a good employee if you dedicate your full life to your company, even putting your family and your own health in second place,” said Turnheim, who also teaches psychology at a Boston-area community college. Besides rather obvious benefits of potential stress reduction, Turnheim said recharging one’s batteries is a way to eventually become more productive and more creative. “If you want a workforce that’s on top of their game, you need a well-rested and energized worker,” Turnheim said. She also cautioned would-be vacationers against continuing to manically check their smartphones during all hours of the day. “When you finally go away, it’s essential to turn off your phone and really put your mind somewhere else and focus on something else that’s not work-related,” Turnheim said. “We’re expected to be on and available 24/7, and part of getting away is to actually get away.” BELOW: View five ideal destinations for the Post50 crowd:

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Former FBI Director Appointed Trustee In MF Global Bankruptcy Case

November 26, 2011

(BEN BERKOWITZ, Reuters) – Former FBI director Louis Freeh was appointed trustee in the MF Global (MFGLQ.PK) bankruptcy case on Friday, days after he was hired to lead an independent probe into a sex abuse scandal at Penn State University. Freeh, also a former judge, was appointed by the United States trustee for the region, according to a court document. The move is subject to court approval. MF Global filed for bankruptcy protection on October 31, after $6.3 billion in risky bets on European sovereign debt spooked investors and an attempt to sell the firm failed. U.S. regulators and Justice Department officials have been investigating the firm’s sudden collapse and trying to locate around $1.2 billion in customer funds. Former MF Global Chief Executive Jon Corzine is expected to testify at a congressional hearing next month, a committee aide said Friday. Freeh was FBI director from 1993 to 2001. Earlier this week, his risk management firm was hired to run a review into Penn State’s handling of sex abuse claims against a former football coach. His firm has also in recent months conducted a probe into cheating on the SAT academic exams. (Reporting by Ben Berkowitz) Copyright 2011 Thomson Reuters. Click for Restrictions .

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Federal Judge: Credit Ratings Not Always Protected Under First Amendment

November 26, 2011

(Jonathan Stempel) – A federal judge has said credit ratings are not always protected opinion under the First Amendment, a defeat for credit rating agencies in a lawsuit brought by investors who lost money on mortgage-backed securities. The November 12 decision was a little-noticed setback for McGraw-Hill Cos’ Standard & Poor’s, Moody’s Corp’s Moody’s Investors Service and Fimalac SA’s Fitch Ratings, which have long invoked First Amendment free speech protection to defend against lawsuits over their ratings. These agencies had argued that the Constitution protected them from claims they issued inflated ratings on more than $5 billion of securities issued in 2006 and 2007, and backed by loans from former Thornburg Mortgage Inc and other lenders. But the judge said the ratings were shared with too small a group of investors to deserve the broad protection sought. “The court rejects the rating agency defendants’ arguments that the First Amendment provides any protection to them under the facts of this case,” U.S. District Judge James Browning in Albuquerque, New Mexico, wrote in a 273-page opinion. Browning nonetheless dismissed claims accusing Moody’s and Fitch, but not S&P, of misrepresentations, saying the investors did not adequately allege that the two agencies did not believe their ratings, or knowingly concealed their inaccuracy. He also said federal law preempts some arguments that the investors used to recover under New Mexico securities law. The judge said the investors may file an amended complaint, which had sought class-action status. If the state law claims went forward, it could provide an avenue for investors to go after the agencies in other states. Browning had denied the agencies’ motion to dismiss the complaint on September 30, without giving reasons. S&P, in a statement, called the First Amendment ruling “inconsistent” with other court rulings. Fitch spokesman Daniel Noonan said that agency is pleased that claims against it were dismissed. Moody’s and lawyers for the investors declined to comment or had no immediate comment. Credit Suisse Group AG and Royal Bank of Scotland Group Plc are among the other defendants in the case. Rating agencies have been widely faulted by investors, regulators and Congress for contributing to the global credit and financial crises that began in 2007 by issuing high ratings on debt that did not deserve it. Thornburg made “jumbo” home loans, larger than $417,000, to borrowers considered good credit risks, but collapsed after margin calls and a plunge in the value of mortgages it held. The Santa Fe, New Mexico-based lender filed for bankruptcy on May 1, 2009, and is now called TMST Inc. LIMITED DISTRIBUTION Investors led by two pension funds, the Maryland-National Capital Park & Planning Commission Employees’ Retirement System, and the Midwest Operating Engineers Pension Trust Fund in Illinois, claimed the agencies issued false and misleading investment-grade ratings for Thornburg securities, and were paid “substantial” sums that compromised their independence. But Browning said the ratings were distributed only to a “limited group” of investors, not the public at large. He also said that unlike publicly traded companies, the trusts from which the securities were issued were not “public figures” entitled to more protections. “The court rejects the rating agency defendants’ argument that the First Amendment protections regarding provably false opinions apply to their credit ratings,” Browning wrote. Rating agencies have largely been successful in raising the First Amendment defense. For example, in September, a federal judge threw out a lawsuit by then-Ohio Attorney General Richard Cordray on behalf of pension funds, and said ratings were “predictive opinions.” In contrast, a Manhattan federal judge, in a 2009 ruling involving Morgan Stanley, said the defense does not apply when ratings were provided to a “select group of investors” in a private placement. S&P has asked the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission not to file threatened civil charges over its ratings for a 2007 offering, Delphinus CDO 2007-1. The case is Genesee County Employees’ Retirement System et al v. Thornburg Mortgage Securities Trust 2006-3 et al, U.S. District Court, District of New Mexico, No. 09-00300. (Reporting by Jonathan Stempel in New York; Editing by Tim Dobbyn) Copyright 2011 Thomson Reuters. Click for Restrictions .

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Americans Tolerate Price Hikes On Everyday Products

November 26, 2011

NEW YORK — The way Americans are chomping Big Macs, lacing up pricey sneakers and gulping peppermint mochas in this economy, you’d think they’re taking advantage of big holiday discounts. The truth is they’re paying more. McDonald’s, Nike, Starbucks and other companies initially worried that customers would run the other way when they started raising prices to offset their higher costs for ingredients, fuel and packaging. But so far, cash-strapped Americans largely have swallowed the price spikes. And they’re continuing to do so during this holiday shopping season. On a recent weekday, five full floors of shoppers in a Nike store in New York didn’t seem to mind paying more for their favorite kicks, including the almost $200 sneakers named for NBA star LeBron James. At a McDonald’s across town, people munched on Big Macs and fries that cost a dime or two more than last year. Customers also piled into a Starbucks down the street, where cappuccinos and many other specialty drinks now top $5. Timothy and Katrin Sullivan, a San Diego couple, estimate that together they spend about $100 a month on skinny caramel macchiatos and pumpkin spice lattes at Starbucks, where prices on some drinks have risen in some regions this year. As parents of five children, they worry about the economy and have cut back on travel and ball games, but so far their morning cup of joe has survived the chopping block despite the rising price. “It’s cheaper than therapy,” says Katrin Sullivan, 39. The prices Americans pay for food, travel and other things have steadily risen this year, according to government data. Prices went up 3.5 percent in October compared with the same month a year ago. At the same time, every month for the past year except one, spending grew 2 percent or more compared with the same month a year ago. That’s given retailers some cautious optimism as they try to gauge just how much more consumers are willing to pay. Pete Bensen, McDonald’s chief financial officer told analysts during the company’s earnings call that the question boils down to this: “Is the consumer in a place that we’re comfortable we can continue to add price increases?” Companies of all stripes have been asking that question a lot. In the past year, they’ve been paying more for materials like beef, corn and fuel that they use to make, package and transport their goods. A combination of poor crop yields in some parts of the world, unrest in the Middle East and greater demand from countries like Brazil and China have sent those costs up. Many costs have come down after spiking in the spring. A pound of coffee, for example, is trading at about $2.30, down from $3 in the spring. But that’s up from $2 a year ago. As a result, Starbucks Corp. this year raised the price of the packaged coffee in its stores by 17 percent. The company declines to say whether prices on brewed drinks have risen or fallen overall in the past year, since those price decisions vary by region. But generally, the Seattle chain says the prices of specialty drinks like lattes and macchiatos are more likely to have risen this year than simpler drinks. The price of a 16-ounce grande cappuccino at Starbucks costs about $4.25, up about 23 percent from $3.45 a year ago, research firm Technomic estimates. Meanwhile, a bagel went up from $1 a year ago to $1.25. That hasn’t stopped Starbucks customers from getting their coffee fix, though. Store traffic rose 6 percent in the most recent fiscal year, which ended in October. Revenue at stores open at least a year – an indicator of a retailer’s health – rose 8 percent. “We think we are in a very good spot right now,” Jeff Hansberry, who runs Starbucks’ consumer products division, said in a call with analysts this month. At Nike Inc., sales rose almost 18 percent in the three-month period through August, even though it raised prices on certain styles this year. Nike hasn’t detailed the price increases, but according to research firm SportsOneSource Group, the suggested price of a pair of this year’s version of LeBron James’ sneakers is about $170, up from about $160 last year. Nike said it expects to raise prices more broadly in the spring. “We have not seen any big price resistance at all,” Charles Denson, president of the Nike Brand, said in a call with analysts. Likewise, traffic and sales grew after McDonald’s raised prices an average of 1 percent in March and another 1.4 percent in May. In the third quarter, guest count increased 2.6 percent. Revenue at stores open at least a year rose 5 percent. (The revenue figure is a snapshot of money spent on food at both company-owned and franchised restaurants. It does not reflect corporate revenue.) McDonald’s won’t give details on which items it raised prices on, but Technomic estimates that a Big Mac costs an average of $3.39, up from $3.19 a year ago. A large order of fries is about $1.89, up from $1.79. And the company signaled that there may be more increases to come. “We will continue to evaluate additional price increases,” said Bensen, McDonald’s CFO, during a call last month. “As we look into 2012, we expect commodity cost increases in the U.S. to be similar to this year’s.” Even if the costs for some raw materials decline, companies are still expected to continue to raise prices during this holiday shopping season. That’s because costs for materials are uncertain, so companies will try to raise prices whenever they think customers will tolerate them. Still, they have to tread lightly or risk losing customers. To be sure, families have trimmed their budgets as the economy plummets. But Americans continue to spend for myriad reasons, even though prices have risen on everything from Coca-Cola soda to Huggies diapers to Ben & Jerry’s ice cream. Some are stomaching the higher prices only on products they need. Others who’ve cut back on bigger frills are willing to splurge on brands they trust or things they see as small indulgences. Still others are apathetic to the increases because “everybody’s doing it.” The weak economy has forced Kenya Leach, a New York actress, to cut back on eating out and trips to the movies and to reconsider her plans to return to school for an anthropology degree. Still, she keeps buying beauty products from Origins, which sells $35 moisturizer and $25 face wash, even though she’s noticed those prices edge up by about a dollar per product, by her calculations. Estee Lauder, the high-end cosmetics company that owns Origins, did not detail its price increases. But CEO Fabrizio Freda said recently during an analyst call that customers have been “resilient” as the company has raised prices and rolled out more expensive products. Leach, for one, figures it’s OK to spend a little more on Origins products because she is cutting out so many other things. “Treating yourself sends off those happy pheromones,” says Leach, 25. “When I get really crabby and upset, I’ll buy a new lipstick and I’ll feel 10 times better.”

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Black Friday Draws Crowds, But Spending In Doubt

November 26, 2011

JESSICA WOHL, (Reuters) – Retailers were hoping for more shoppers like Shawn Elzia as the annual Black Friday bargain stampede marked the unofficial start of what is widely expected to be a middling holiday shopping season. The Brooklyn, New York teacher, one of hundreds of thousands of shoppers jostling for deals around the country, said he ended up spending about 25 percent more than he planned, even while worrying about the state of the economy. “I did not expect such deals,” the 33-year old said as he left a Macy’s store in Jersey City, New Jersey clutching bags full of clothing for himself and his family. “It’s slashed down to the bones,” he said. “There were some great discounts if you showed up early.” Deals are always part of the picture on the Friday after Thanksgiving. This year was notable for an earlier opening for some retailers and possibly for the one shopper using pepper spray to make sure she could get a popular video game system. The early start by stores brought out younger shoppers such as Alina Ybarra, who spent the wee hours of the morning with her friends as they all looked for items for themselves. “It’s really chaotic,” Ybarra, 17, said of her first Black Friday outing as she finished her shopping in Santa Monica, California. She said that she liked the deals at stores such as Gap Inc’s Old Navy and Urban Outfitters. “It seems like a lot of teenagers were the primary shoppers, maybe because of the hour, but I think net-net it’s not really going to result in an incremental positive for retailers,” Ed Yruma, senior equity analyst at KeyBanc Capital Markets, said after checking out crowds at the Mall of America in Bloomington, Minnesota. He said shoppers were not carrying a lot of shopping bags. Leon Clare, 24, and Shawn Sykes, 27, both U.S. Navy Corpsmen, drove about 125 miles from 29 Palms Marine Base to Santa Monica so they each could spend close to $175 on a pair of Air Jordan Retro 3 shoes in “Black Cement,” popular new sneakers from Nike Inc. “This is for me,” said Clare, who plans to spend more on holiday gifts later on in the season. “I’m leaving for Afghanistan in March. I’m getting something for everyone, just in case I don’t come back.” WORRIED… AGAIN More than 120 stores at the Mall of America opened at midnight. The crowd at that point was about 15,000 people. Mall operators estimated that it was the largest crowd ever at the mall, which is big enough to hold seven Yankee Stadiums. While eager shoppers emerged from stores around the country lugging big-screen TVs and bags full of video games and toys, it was far from certain that people will pull out their wallets for much more than the best deals this year. Shoppers with limited budgets started using layaway at chains such as Walmart as early as October. Retail shares fell more than the overall market on Friday. “Americans are still worried about jobs, still worried about the economy,” said Mike Thielmann, group executive vice president at J.C. Penney, who noted that shoppers were buying gifts and for themselves, and said jewelry was selling well. In Houston, Rico Salvosa, 60, bought two cameras at Best Buy and said he had saved about $170. “It’s worse than before because business is slow,” Salvosa, who wholesales stone countertops, said as he left the store with his daughters. “I don’t have a lot of savings for holiday shopping. I told them, ‘I cannot buy everything that you’d like.’” Competition among the retailers was fierce as it was among shoppers, as some stores opened hours earlier than before. Outside Macy’s flagship store in New York, some Occupy Wall Street activists chanted “boycott Macy’s” and “stop supporting big corporations” even as about 9,000 people lined up to shop when the store opened at midnight. Opening early appeared to work, judging from the long lines at stores such as Macy’s, Toys R Us, Best Buy, Walmart and Target. “It was crazy around midnight and one in the morning,” said a Target employee at the chain’s East Harlem, New York store, where the crowd thinned out later on Friday morning. Even after a Toys R Us in New Jersey had been open for nearly an hour, at 9:50 p.m. EST on Thursday night, there was still a line of about 300 people waiting to get inside. The 24 hours that started at 9 p.m. Thursday will be the biggest in retail history, with sales estimated at $27 billion, according to Craig Johnson, president of Customer Growth Partners, one of the few experts predicting a strong season. The term “Black Friday” commonly refers to the day after Thanksgiving, the traditional start of the busy holiday shopping season when retailers do brisk business. (See related story: Spirited ‘Black Friday’ has dark roots. While it is the busiest day of the year in terms of store traffic, it does not always mean that sales will soar for the season. Despite brisk sales right after Thanksgiving in 2008 and 2009, total holiday season sales fell as the recession gripped the country. The National Retail Federation, an industry trade group, expects 152 million people to hit stores this weekend, up 10.1 percent from last year. Yet it expects sales for the full November-December holiday season to rise just 2.8 percent, well below the pace of last year when sales rose 5.2 percent. Luxury chains such as Saks Inc and those catering to lower-income shoppers, such as dollar stores, are expected to do well this shopping season. “For our products that are $25,000 and up, growth is phenomenal,” said Mark Vadon, founder of online jewelry retailer Blue Nile. “Price points under $100 are also doing really well. For the mass part of the market, consumers are strapped and being a lot more wary.” Overall, retail executives and analysts expect a more competitive shopping season than in 2010. Unemployment remains at 9 percent, European debt woes are weighing on the stock market, and consumer confidence remains spotty. Online sales on Thursday and Friday surpassed last year, and more shoppers used their mobile devices to buy, according to IBM data. The amount U.S. shoppers spent via eBay Mobile more than doubled on Thanksgiving, while eBay’s PayPal Mobile unit saw a five-fold increase in global mobile payment volume versus last Thanksgiving. The online push put pressure on some companies. Walmart.com saw some very high traffic, so some customers may have experienced delays as they tried to check out, it said. Even Apple Inc gets into the Christmas spirit on Black Friday, the only day that it usually offers discounts. This year it offered its typical $101 discount on its $900-plus Mac laptops and $41 or more off its $499-plus iPads. (Reporting by Dhanya Skariachan, Liana B. Baker and Phil Wahba in New York, Mihir Dalal in Jersey City, New Jersey, Jessica Wohl in Chicago, Diane Bartz in Hyattsville, Maryland, Lisa Baertlein and Edwin Chan in Los Angeles, Alistair Barr in San Francisco and Bruce Nichols in Houston. Editing by Jon Loades-Carter, Phil Berlowitz and Robert MacMillan) Copyright 2011 Thomson Reuters. Click for Restrictions .

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Violence Mars Black Friday Shopping

November 26, 2011

A woman who allegedly fired pepper spray at other customers during a Black Friday sale has surrendered to authorities, Los Angeles police said Saturday. Police Sgt. Jose Valle said the woman who allegedly caused minor injuries to 20 shoppers at a Los Angeles-area Walmart turned herself in Friday night. She is currently not in custody but could face battery charges, Valle said. The woman’s identity was not released, but police said they plan to release more details Saturday morning. The attack took place about 10:20 p.m. Thursday shortly after doors opened for the sale. The store had brought out a crate of discounted Xbox video game players, and a crowd had formed to wait for the unwrapping. Valle says the woman began spraying people in order to get an advantage. The incident was among those nationwide in which violence marred the traditional kickoff to the holiday shopping season. In the most serious case, a robber shot a shopper who refused to give up his purchases outside a San Leandro, Calif., Walmart store, leaving the victim hospitalized in critical but stable condition. Police in San Leandro, about 15 miles east of San Francisco, said the victim and his family were walking to their car around 1:45 a.m. Friday when they were confronted by a group of men who demanded their shopping items. When the family refused, a fight broke out, and one of the robbers pulled a gun and shot the man, said Sgt. Mike Sobek. Meanwhile, police in suburban Phoenix came under fire when a video was posted online showing a 54-year-old grandfather on the floor of a Walmart store with a bloody face, after police said he was subdued Thursday night trying to shoplift during a chaotic rush for discounted video games. The video, posted on YouTube, shows Jerald Allen Newman unconscious and bloodied as outraged customers yell expletives and say “that’s police brutality” and “he wasn’t doing anything.” In a police report that redacted the names of officers and witnesses, Newman’s wife and other witnesses said he was just trying to help his grandson after the boy was trampled by shoppers, and only put a video game in his waistband to free his hands to help the boy. Larry Hall, assistant chief of Buckeye police, said Newman was resisting arrest and it appeared the officer acted within reason. Hall said the officer decided to do a leg sweep and take him to the ground but the man unfortunately hit his head. “The store was incredibly crowded, and I was concerned about other customers’ safety,” the officer wrote in his police report. Hall said Newman, who had a bloody nose and received four stitches on his forehead, was booked on suspicion of shoplifting and resisting arrest. In Sacramento, Calif., a man was stabbed outside a mall Friday in an apparent gang-related incident as shoppers were hitting the stores. The victim was taken to a hospital with non-life-threatening injuries, police said. The stabbing stemmed from a fight between two groups around 3 a.m. in front of a Macy’s department store at the Arden Fair Mall. No arrests have been made. Police were hoping surveillance video will help identify the suspects.

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Nick Cowling: The Scarcity of Good Information

November 26, 2011

In a world that is so readily connected to so much information, it seems totally counterintuitive that useful, timely, relevant information is a rarity. We’re all tracking, seeking and consuming more information all the time. The problem is there’s so much to sort and filter through to find the good stuff. Frankly, consumers are so hungry for the ‘right’ information and so demanding of immediacy they will do whatever it takes to get it right now. Nothing less will do. You may be thinking there’s a concern of information overload, but the fact is consumers still embrace relevant, personal, useful information, any time, any place and any way they can get it. Despite the fact we’re all bombarded with information, there’s little to no sign of fatigue. Information has always been a status symbol in society, whether it was elders and wise men of the past or today’s news and information junkies. If you’re in the know, it gives you some sort of status amongst your peer groups. There are two important points for organizations in todays over abundant, yet info-scarce world. First, the desire and outright need to visualize information — basically, the presentation of information — is as important as the information itself, because consumers need and want to access, visualize and understand the world around them as quickly as possible. Organizations that can’t communicate well and quickly get marginalized. The second opportunity for organizations is to act as the champion for easily accessed, relevant data. By being able to sort and filter the hoards of data available today and serve it up to the consumer, organizations must create meaningful, new relationships that can vault a company’s reputation and credibility. The ability to connect real world objects to digital information is an emerging trend that will only explode in the near future. You can see it today in the popularity of QR codes. Frankly, every barcode, sensor and even physical space has become an opportunity to connect, sort and share relevant, rich information in real time. Organizations must be mindful of how they sort and share information — they need to help consumers tell stories, make the data more meaningful to individual audiences or help consumers benefit from their own stored information (tracking your exercise goals or journaling on a particular subject matter). Communications today has become more complex to deliver, because it needs to live easily at the consumer level where it can be individualized. A broad-brush approach simply will not do. Find ways to share, filter, sort and visualize the data for your customer/consumer, and you’ll soon see them leaning on you more often. Visit Nick on Facebook .

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Egypt’s Economy Suffers With Latest Outbreak Of Political Violence

November 26, 2011

CAIRO — Drivers passing Tahrir Square in downtown Cairo curse the protesters. On radio shows, callers question whether the youth activists and others involved in the new wave of demonstrations over the past week are nationalists, selfish children or saboteurs. Political differences aside, what has become clear is that the latest clamor against Egypt’s military rulers is pummeling the country’s already flailing economy at a crucial time when many hoped winter tourism would pick up. A financial crisis is looming, say analysts. “We’re not far off,” said Neil Shearing, chief emerging markets economist with Capital Economics. “There’s enough money left in the coffers to get through the year, but not much beyond that. Crunch time is two to three months away.” It took 30 years to engineer the revolution that ousted former President Hosni Mubarak in February. But it only took months to push the 7 percent annual growth rate of recent years to an anemic forecast of only about 1 percent this year. The difficulties keep mounting. The stock market tanks daily and foreign reserves have fallen by almost 40 percent so far this year. The drop is linked to the protests that have persisted since Mubarak’s fall, and more specifically, the wide gap between the expectations of the population after the uprising and the reality of what the government could deliver. From iconic Tahrir Square, the epicenter of the revolution, to the city’s middle income neighborhoods and slums, the sobering realization that the hopes for democracy have not translated into a better standard of living is leaving Egyptians increasingly frustrated – with the military rulers, with the interim government that resigned a few days ago and, perhaps more troublingly, with each other. “The move toward democracy is something that should be a beacon for the rest of the region,” said Shearing. “But we’ve clearly reached a point … where there needs to be some political stability because the financing risks are severe.” As of October, the country’s net foreign reserves had fallen to $22 billion from $36 billion at the end of 2010. At least part of that money has gone to supporting the Egyptian pound, which economists worry could face severe depreciation if officials don’t shore up the country’s finances. At the famed pyramids of Giza, when horse rides, papyrus prints and tours failed to entice some tourists, a young guide turned to the unorthodox. “Girls?” offered 23-year-old Samir Adham, flashing a sly grin. “Hashish?” He apologized when he realized the offer was made to a reporter. “No one comes any more,” he explained. “What can I do? I have to make a living,” he said, bemoaning the hammering of Egypt’s vital tourism industry, one of the country’s top money-earners, since the revolution. The troubles confronting Adham and others in the tourism sector are a window into the country’s broader challenges. Egypt’s tourism sector has accounted for roughly 10 percent of gross domestic product and employs Egyptians in a range of supporting industries – from guides and camel touts to hotel workers and artisans. “Most shops have either let go of most of their employees or cut their salaries by at least 50 percent,” said Khaled Osman, who owns a shop near the pyramids employing about 20 people. Since the revolution, the unemployment rate has climbed to almost 12 percent in the third quarter of 2011, compared to just shy of 9 percent a year earlier. If the uprising that pushed Mubarak from power marked the start of the industry’s demise for the year, then the latest protests in Tahrir Square have further cemented the losses. The most recent clashes began as protesters returned to the square calling for the military to hand over power immediately to a civilian government. Among their complaints was that the ruling generals were no different than Mubarak and that they had run the economy into the ground. The images of activists and security forces hurling rocks at each other through a thick fog of tear gas is hardly encouraging tourists. The unrest hasn’t sat well with investors either. The cost of government borrowing has gone up and the central bank on Friday was forced to raise interest rates for the first time in roughly three years. Borrowing costs will likely climb even more after ratings agency Standard & Poor’s on Thursday drove Egypt’s sovereign debt rating deeper into junk status, citing what it said was “an ongoing high, and recently increased, risk of challenges to political institutions that will possibly involve further domestic conflict.” “These challenges could arise if populist demands for greater political participation are thwarted, or from demands for improved living standards from different sectors of the population no matter who is governing Egypt,” the agency said. The impact of the uncertainty is clear at Cairo’s airport, where officials report that passenger traffic has fallen off sharply since the start of the latest clashes a week ago. Some flights arrive with fewer than 30 passengers. In Luxor, home to some of the country’s most prized archaeological sites, tourism officials said hotel occupancy rates have plunged to under 10 percent. The downturn there is especially troubling because the winter months are typically when tourists head to southern Egypt, and Luxor and Aswan rely overwhelmingly on tourism revenues. The declines are mirrored in Cairo, where five-star hotels sit largely empty. Only Red Sea resorts such as Hurghada and Sharm el-Sheik are still going strong, with occupancy rates of about 70 percent, according to Amani El-Torgoman, tourism operations manager at Travco, one of the region’s largest travel companies. But even there, it has come at a price. “We’re running after clients with best offers and last minute offers,” said El-Torgoman, noting that most properties had cut their rates by as much as 50 percent to lure in visitors with all-inclusive packages that can go for as little as $50 per night. While the latest clashes in Cairo have yet to be reflected in tourism figures, officials expect the hit to be hard and to build on top of an already declining interest on the part of Europeans, the bulk of visitors. Irina Tyurina, a spokesperson for the Russian Association of Tourist Agencies, said the sales had dropped by 57 percent over the past six months compared to the same period of last year. The so-called “Classic tours,” which involve trips through Cairo and then down to southern Egypt, are all but dead, said Travco’s El-Torgoman. “If things continue like this, there are a lot of people who will go out of business,” she said. “A lot (of smaller companies and shops) can’t afford paying the salaries or even sustaining small losses.” The same argument carries across other sectors of the economy and into the daily lives of Egyptians who complain that the only thing that has come from the ouster of Mubarak has been even more of an increase in prices, coupled with a surge in crime and the headaches that come with the daily protests in Cairo. Already nearly half the population of more than 80 million lives near or below the poverty line set by the World Bank of $2 a day. “Why can’t they see that they’re destroying the country,” railed Mohammed El-Sharkawy, an accountant who moonlights as an electrician to make ends meet. The activists say “they want democracy and freedom, but don’t understand that it comes with responsibility.” > ____ > Associated Press correspondents Vladimir Isachenkov in Moscow, Nicole Winfield in Rome, Kirsten Grieshaber in Berlin and Alexander Besant in Cairo contributed.

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Frederik Meijer Dead: Meijer Inc. Founder Dies At 91

November 26, 2011

GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. — Frederik Meijer, who built the regional retail powerhouse Meijer Inc. while nurturing his lifelong love of the arts, died late Friday at a hospital in western Michigan. He was 91. The billionaire passed away at the Spectrum Health System in Grand Rapids after suffering a stroke in his home early Friday morning, according to a statement issued by the company. Meijer was credited with starting the supercenter store format in the 1960s that made Meijer a successful Midwest retailer. By 2009, Meijer had 180 of the giant stores throughout Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, Michigan and Ohio with annual sales of $15 billion. He and his wife also gave millions of dollars to causes in the Grand Rapids area, and arts projects were major benefactors. “The Meijer family thanks everyone for their thoughts and prayers and requests their privacy be respected at this difficult time,” the company’s statement said. Meijer was 14 when his Dutch immigrant father, Hendrik, opened his first grocery store in Greenville in 1934 with $338.76 worth of merchandise purchased on credit. The younger Meijer worked 40 hours a week at the store throughout high school. “We were hard up, and you know what? I didn’t even feel deprived,” he said in a 2002 interview. “I had a good time in the store, I was a decent student in school – I had a B-plus average.” Meijer and his father expanded their grocery operation in 1962 to include general merchandise, creating their first Thrifty Acres supercenter. “I really enjoyed working with my dad till he died (in 1964, at age 80),” Meijer said. “We had a marvelous relationship.” The stores were renamed Meijer in 1984, and the company became one of the nation’s largest family-owned retail businesses. Frederik Meijer was 82 before he took the title of chairman emeritus and began devoting less time to the company. One of his three sons, Hank Meijer, previously said his father never thought he knew more than anyone else, so he trusted people to do their jobs and listened to the advice of others. Meijer was born Dec. 7, 1919, in Greenville and in 1946 married Lena Rader after meeting her at the first Meijer store in Greenville, where she was a clerk. They spent their honeymoon visiting new stores. The Meijers donated generously to programs in the Grand Rapids area through the foundation he established in 1990. The Frederik Meijer Gardens & Sculpture Park, a 125-acre botanical garden outside Grand Rapids, opened in 1995. A 30-acre sculpture park featuring two dozen works by important modern sculptors was added seven years later. Meijer collected sculptures for years, filling a garage with statues of animals and people before he found a home for many of them in the botanical garden. Those pieces, placed throughout the garden, are separate from the works in the sculpture area. His interest in the arts stemmed from his youth. Even in the hardest of times, his parents made sure their children learned about culture. “When I was young, I had piano lessons, clarinet lessons and violin lessons,” he said. “My sister had piano, violin and viola (lessons). I was encouraged to sing in choirs. … “The point is, no matter how hard up we were in the Depression, certain things like that – music lessons – came as a part of life, rather than saying we couldn’t afford it.” Meijer carried that belief to the community. Declaring that city dwellers needed to get outdoors to preserve “mental stability,” he donated seed money to develop a network of hiking and cycling trails in western Michigan. “Beyond raising a family and working and surviving, that’s where the arts come in, and that’s the sugar and spice,” he said. Meijer is survived by his wife, Lena, and sons Hank, Doug and Mark. Funeral arrangements are pending. The death was first reported by The Grand Rapids Press.

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Oracle eyes RightNow Technologies buyout

November 26, 2011

(MENAFN) Oracle Corp. said that it would acquire RightNow Technologies Inc, the cloud-based customer service provider, for USD1.5 billion, reported Xinhua News. The business software giant added …

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DuPont’s net income hikes 23% in Q3

November 26, 2011

(MENAFN) US DuPont Co. said that due to the surge in titanium-dioxide pigment’s prices, in the third quarter, net income hiked 23 percent to USD452 million, compared with USD367 million in 2010′s …

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The key data awaited from Asia this week

November 26, 2011

Several macroeconomic data will be released during the coming week, starting with China’s PMI manufacturing data for November and followed by Japan’s industrial production for October. Initially, …

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European Week: Eyes on the EU Finance Ministers, Osborne’s Autumn Statement and more bond auctions amid high uncertainty

November 26, 2011

Another busy week in Europe is about to start where the sentiment is still deteriorating, the outlook worsening and uncertainty is certainty the theme. The focus will remain on the predominant debt …

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Online Sales Leap On Black Friday

November 26, 2011

LOS ANGELES — Online shoppers didn’t wait around until Cyber Monday to start their holiday shopping. According to IBM Corp. research unit Coremetrics, U.S. consumers spent 20 percent more online on Black Friday, the day after Thanksgiving, this year than last, while online sales jumped 39 percent on Thanksgiving Day. Coremetrics measures sales data from more than 500 online retailers, including half of the top 50. It doesn’t reveal its partners or specific dollar figures. Both Coremetrics and e-commerce payment site PayPal, a united of eBay Inc., said shopping by mobile phone is increasingly substantially this year. PayPal said it saw five times more mobile payments worldwide this Thanksgiving, compared with last year. And Coremetrics said about 17 percent of Black Friday visitors to retail websites came via mobile devices, up from about 5 percent a year ago. There were sporadic reports of shoppers having trouble with crowded websites. Some visitors to Walmart.com reported problems paying for their merchandise at checkout, according to posts on GottaDeal.com and other websites. Toys R Us Inc. spokeswoman Kathleen Waugh said Friday that the toy retailer’s site experienced “some slowness” when it unveiled some online deals at 9 p.m. Eastern time Thursday. She said the company’s online sales are up “extensively” from a year ago. Online sales typically account for about one-tenth of total sales in November, one of the biggest shopping periods of the year, said John Squire, an executive with IBM’s e-commerce marketing unit. That share looks to rise this year. IBM’s Coremetrics predicts online sales will grow about 15 percent this year, compared with growth of a few percentage points for brick-and-mortar stores. Some retailers save their online deals for the first business day of the week following Thanksgiving, now known as Cyber Monday. And Squire predicted that Cyber Monday’s online sales will exceed the total reached on Black Friday by early afternoon. Squire said its partners’ websites hadn’t had major glitches Thursday or Friday. “People keep spending money online, so that’s a great indicator that the sites are running,” he said.

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Small Retailers Fight Back On ‘Small Business Saturday’

November 26, 2011

Big retailers like Walmart, Best Buy and Target may command the headlines on Black Friday, with their $300 laptops and $200 flatscreen TVs and crowds camping out overnight for the best deals. But don’t count out the mom-and-pops, who are fighting back with deals of their own on the second-annual Small Business Saturday. Across the nation, small retailers are armed and ready for what they hope will be their biggest shopping day of the year: Small Business Saturday . Sandwiched between the powerhouse Black Friday and Cyber Monday, Small Business Saturday was created by American Express, which offers registered customers a $25 credit if they spend $25 or more on their American Express card at a participating small business on that day. This year, President Obama endorsed Small Business Saturday describing it as a way to “keep our local economies strong and help maintain an American economy that can compete and win in the 21st century.” “Research shows that the holiday season makes up for the bulk of small businesses’ yearly sales,” says Patricia Norins, an independent consultant and Small Business Saturday shopping expert for American Express. “Right now, retailers are looking for as many ways as possible to drive traffic to their stores.” With projections that 90 million consumers will be out shopping this Small Business Saturday, Norins calls this “a huge opportunity.” Norins has talked to small-business owners who are planning everything from balloons and banners to Santas and tree lightings. Many are joining forces to produce shopping maps of participating local businesses or offering cross promotions such as handing out different free cookies at neighboring stores. Norins believes this type of momentum can translate beyond the day to connect customers with local businesses year-round. “Consumers have a huge opportunity to find unique products and personalized customer service,” she says. “It instills a sense of community, which is important on a local and national level — more money stays in the community and more jobs are created.” We talked to eight small retailers nationwide to find out how and why they’re going above and beyond to attract shoppers this Small Business Saturday.

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Black Friday Shooting Rattles East Bay Walmart

November 26, 2011

A 20-year-old Oakland man was named as one of several suspects in a shooting that happened during a Black Friday robbery in a Walmart store parking lot in San Leandro. Police arrived at the scene at 15555 Hesperian Boulevard at around 1:50 a.m. and found a man had been shot, and his family members had detained a suspect, who police identified Friday afternoon as Tony Phillips of Oakland.

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10-year-old boy defends mom with BB gun

November 26, 2011

(MENAFN – Jordan Times) Police in Bellingham, Washington, say a 10-year-old boy defended his mother from an attacker by shooting him in the face with a BB rifle as many as four times. The man …

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Man arrested over $1m suitcase left in Aussie café

November 26, 2011

(MENAFN – Jordan Times) Police in Sydney may be close to unravelling the mystery of a man who left a lot of dough at an upscale pizzeria and cafe – nearly 1 million Australian dollars. Police …

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Germany- Daimler pulls plug on loss-making Maybach

November 26, 2011

(MENAFN – Gulf Times) Daimler will axe its Maybach superluxury brand after years of losses and moribund sales, replacing the car with more expensive models of its Mercedes-Benz S-Class flagship …

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Russia’s Lukoil reports 20% fall in profits in Q3

November 26, 2011

(MENAFN) Lukoil reported 20 percent fall in third quarter profits, blaming higher taxes and a weakened ruble, Associated Press reported. Russia’s second largest oil producer recorded USD2.2 …

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‘Greece needs more austerity to hit targets’

November 26, 2011

(MENAFN – Gulf Times) Greece’s budget deficit will not fall below a key eurozone ceiling by 2014 as planned if the debt-laden country fails to decide additional austerity measures in June, a set of …

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Samsung Sells 300,000 LTE Smartphones

November 26, 2011

(MENAFN – Qatar News Agency) Samsung Electronics Co. sold more than 300,000 units of smartphones running on long-term evolution (LTE) networks, the high-speed wireless data service, in about one …

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Daimler plans to replace Maybach with S-Class

November 26, 2011

(MENAFN) Daimler AG, amker of Mercedes cars, plans to stop the super- luxury Maybach brand to end almost a decade of losses. The German luxury car maker said it will focus on its flagship …

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European Shares Drop, Euro Falls on Debt Crisis Impasse

November 26, 2011

(MENAFN – Qatar News Agency) European shares fell while the euro fell to a fresh seven-week low against the dollar on Friday on lack of agreement between European leaders on how to tackle the …

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Asian Markets Down On European Disagreement

November 26, 2011

(MENAFN – Qatar News Agency) Asian markets mostly fell on Friday on the European discord to address the Eurozone’s debt crisis. Germany and France proposed changes to EU treaties to improve …

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Hillary Peterson: A Green Girl’s Guide to Eco-Friendly Cyber Monday Shopping

November 26, 2011

For many of you, Cyber Monday has become the holy grail of holiday shopping. The coveted deals day that also allows you to be a smarter, greener shopper. For the most part, shopping online is smarter and greener, and a great way to finish up those holiday gifting loose ends you likely didn’t cover on Black Friday. Not to mention, shopping online can be a more relaxing and an eco-friendly experience. Ensure your Cyber Monday shopping is as eco-friendly as possible by following these tips: 1. Shop with companies who share your eco-friendly values. The most important advice I can give you is to support the environment with your wallet. Let your money follow your values. Shop with companies who incorporate eco-friendly values at all levels — in production, shipping and beyond. 2. Shop with local companies first, then online. Do most of your holiday shopping locally with sustainable, eco-friendly companies — using Cyber Monday to fill your remaining gifting needs. When you do shop online, request that each company not include catalogs, printed invoices or other unnecessary non-recycled materials with your order. 3. Cut out the middleman. Organize your gifting list by ordering all gifts for those you can personally give, then shop at the least number of online stores possible. Ordering 1 gift at 10 different stores has a larger eco footprint than ordering 10 gifts, shipped in one box, from one store. In addition, cut out an additional shipment route by shipping directly to recipients who are not local to you. Now that you’ve made your list and checked it twice, consider these green gifts from eco-friendly companies offering Cyber Monday deals and beyond. Gift the gift that changes lives: Kiva offers a gift card that allows the recipient to select an entrepreneur for start-up funding. I have found that this is a gift that my children’s teachers really appreciate. Seva Foundation offers “Gifts of Service” and gift card packs. These special gifts fund a specific, compassion service and provide a stunning photograph card to give. Just Give offers an a customizable gift card, that allows the recipient to donate to their favorite charity. Give the gift of ethical fashion: Stewart+Brown is an ethical fashion brand, founded in 2002 in sunny Los Angeles. They donate a percentage of sales to non-profit environmental and social welfare programs. Save 10% on orders over $200 (code: holiday1020), 15% on orders over $350 (code: holiday20) and 20% on orders over $500 (code: holiday20). Nau is a sustainable outdoor, urban clothing brand located in Portland, Oregon. You can save 25% off two or more styles from the men’s or women’s gift sections (code: 2for25), through 12/6/2011. Hessnatur is an ethical fashion brand, featuring sustainable and luxurious materials like Yak wool and unbleached cashmere. Through 11/30/2011, you can receive 25% off site wide, plus free shipping on all orders (code: MSA255). Give the gift of recycled and upcycled: Ecoist handmade bags and jewelry are made from recycled candy wrappers, food packages and other recycled materials. You can receive 15% off all candy wrapper bags the entire day (code: CYBERMONDAY). Speesees is fun, fair and organic children’s clothing — featuring the best recycled clothing you can find. For the entire day, save 30% off entire site (no code necessary). Give the gift of natural beauty: Of course, any Cyber Monday green guide would not be complete without mentioning the 25% off our own natural skincare products — Marie Veronique Organics — for the entire day (code: CyberMonday). Rated by the EWG as one of the safest skin care lines on the market with natural, organic and fair trade ingredients whenever possible, packaged in recyclable materials and 10% of company profits are donated annually to support the environment and create better opportunities for women and children in Third World countries.

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A Black Friday Stampede: Just As You Imagined It

November 25, 2011

If you had to conjure up what you already thought a Black Friday crowd would look like as soon as the doors of a store offering deep, 3am discounts opened up, this might be it. A lot of screaming, running and probably one or two tramplings. According to YouTuber thecoke , this took place at an Urban Outfitters at Thousand Oaks Mall in California. Of course, it could totally pass for a flashback from the beginning of the zombie plague on “The Walking Dead.” Did you do any Black Friday shopping and if so, what were the crowds like: tame or apocalyptic?

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Nathalie Rothschild: On ‘Buy Nothing Day,’ It’s the Occupiers vs. the Masses

November 25, 2011

On Black Friday, the true colors of the Occupy Wall Street movement really shone through. Premised on the idea that it speaks on behalf of 99 percent of Americans, the Occupy movement is in fact deeply contemptuous of the masses. In no way was this made clearer than through the alignment of the Buy Nothing Day campaign and the Occupy movement. Part of the Occupy X-Mas initiative, which will last throughout the holiday season, Buy Nothing Day kicked off the day after Thanksgiving on so-called Black Friday. This is when vast numbers of Americans go on shopping sprees with hopes of laying their hands on cut-price flat-screen TVs, sneakers and other goods that are on their families’ Christmas wish lists. Many get in line hours before the shops open, some even set up tents and camp in front of stores to get in early. The Occupiers are apparently horrified at the prospect of seeing malls and high-street shops filled with the bargain-hunting masses, or ‘the 99%’ as the Occupiers call the American people, when they need to align great numbers to their cause in order to give it an air of legitimacy and popularity. But of course Occupy Wall Street never spoke for 99 percent of Americans. This was always a fantasy figure that lent itself well to sloganeering and to presenting a black-and-white view of the world, according to which the powerless masses struggling to get by are on one side, and the fat cat CEOs and reckless bankers are on the other. In this Star Wars -like narrative, the Occupiers serve as the heroes who will purportedly save the masses from their downfall by enlightening them and campaigning on their behalf. The message that the Occupiers want to send through their anti-consumption campaign is that Americans have been brainwashed by corporations, that they have been induced to blind over-consumption and unthinking acceptance of the messages put out by ‘the 1%’. As one Occupy sympathizer recently put it on the movement’s website: ‘The working class in this country has been brainwashed by MSM, Fox News, and the right-wing propaganda machine… We need to de-programme people against the brainwashing they’ve experienced.’ This is the Occupier’s Burden, a kind of re-vamped version of the civilising mission described by Rudyard Kipling: to ‘de-program’ Americans and, in the meantime, render them voiceless and clueless so that the apparently enlightened Occupiers can justify stepping in to define their interests for them and to speak on their behalf. The message of Buy Nothing Day follows in this vein. Initiated by Adbusters , every anti-consumption hipster’s must-have mag, the campaign is essentially promulgation for mass austerity — a point well-made on the American Situation blog — and it is an elaborate way of telling people they are stupid, irresponsible, greedy and shallow. For this year’s Black Friday, Adbusters promised ‘flash mobs, consumer fasts, mall sit-ins, community events, credit card-ups, whirly-marts and jams, jams, jams!’ It was Adbusters that originally called for the occupation of Wall Street back in September and designed the Occupy movement’s stylish posters and other propaganda. In a message posted on OWS’ website in the run-up to Black Friday, Adbusters says: You’ve been sleeping on the streets for two months pleading peacefully for a new spirit in economics. And just as your camps are raided, your eyes pepper sprayed and your head’s knocked in, another group of people are preparing to camp-out. Only these people aren’t here to support Occupy Wall Street, they’re here to secure their spot in line for a Black Friday bargain at Super Target and Macy’s. There you have it. On the one side are the Occupiers, ready to deploy every thinkable kind of shenanigan to bring the message home to those on the other side — i.e. vast numbers of ordinary Americans — that they are ‘rabid consumers’ hooked on ‘conspicuous consumption,’ that they are acting like zombies by pigging out and destroying the planet with their addiction to cheap electronics and videogames. A video ad for the 2007 Buy Nothing Day shows a globe in which a big, fat, lip-licking, burping pig sticks out of North America. A voice-over informs viewers that ‘we are the most voracious consumers in the world — a world that could die because of the way we North Americans live.’ In short, Adbusters and their fellow Occupiers see Americans — or, in their own lingo, ‘the 99%’ — as gluttonous, obese pigs. What a joyful holiday message.

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Cops Taser Black Friday Shopper

November 25, 2011

If they’re not pepper spraying each other or rioting over waffle makers, Black Friday customers are being tasered by cops and being violently arrested for shoplifting. WAAY reports that cops said they had to use a stun gun to subdue belligerent customer Christopher Blake Pyron at a Wal-Mart in Florence, Ala. From WAAY: According to police, Pyron was stumbling and grabbing items and causing a scene in the busy store. An officer tried to get Pyron to calm down, and tried to take him somewhere less crowded. According to investigators, Pyron jerked away and swung at the officer. At that point, the officer grabbed his taser and shot Pyron, taking him to the ground. Pyron was charged with public intoxication, disorderly conduct and resisting arrest, according to WAAY. The arrest wasn’t the only taser-aided cuffing of this holiday season. Miltord Patch reports that an officer used a stun gun to bring down a man involved in a scuffle at a Wal-Mart on Thursday night. Then there’s the case of the grandpa who was either the victim of a violent police mistake, or a shoplifter taken down with appropriate force, depending on who you ask. MyFox Phoenix reports that witnesses said a young boy was trampled by bargain-hunting shoppers at a Buckeye, Ariz. Wal-Mart. In an effort to free up his hands so he could protect his grandson, witnesses told the station that the grandpa put a video game in his pants. But police told a different story. They told MyFox that the man was trying to shoplift and when they tried to question him about the video game, he started “flailing his arms.” Police used a leg sweep to bring the man down. He hit his head and had to be treated at a local hospital, police told the station. He’s charged with resisting arrest and shoplifting.

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Small Business Saturday In New York: A Primer And A Guide

November 25, 2011

Mayor Bloomberg in collaboration with American Express started Small Business Saturday last year to spur sales for local shops that weren’t retail monsters like Walmart or Target. And this year more stores are taking part in the incentive as New Yorkers emerge from their turkey coma to buy more stuff — but not get crushed in the process. Paper magazine recently teamed up with AmEx to produce an incredible guide for New Yorkers of all boroughs to have on hand for the second annual Saturday shopathon. ( READ IT HERE ). Some of their highlights, and ours, below: The Future Perfect The design store in Williamsburg that has everything you’ve ever wanted and prices you can’t usually afford, says that “full-priced, in stock items excluding custom orders” are 10 percent off. 115 North 6th Street Brooklyn, NY 11211-3001 (718) 599-6278 Brooklyn Wine Exchange Home to really knowledgable and friendly wine people, the BWE is a place where you can bug experts about anything and they’ll talk your ear off with their boozey brilliance (in a good way). They’re holding a tasting from 2-6pm on Saturday of Christmas-style wines, mostly reds. Two wines from the tasting will be 5% off, and three wines will be 10% off. 38 Court St, Brooklyn, NY 718-855-9463 Housing Works Ok, this one is actually a Black Friday sale, but they’re a small business and charitable, too! So update your calendar for this one. 30% off everything in the store. 126 Crosby Street Hours: Mon-Fri: 10 AM-9 PM, Sat-Sun: 10 AM-5 PM Paisanos Meat Market Family owned for generations, Paisanos is a time capsule full of incredible cuts and meats, expert butchers and an amazing selection of gourmet canned goods and pastas. You truly don’t get more authentic than this. Will there be specials on Saturday? “We got specials every day,” they said. 162 Smith Street, Brooklyn 718 855-2641 McNally Jackson Books Prince St’s greatest bookstore (and sassiest Twitter account ) is offering 20 percent off all merchandise. Grab a coffee in their cafe and get lost for hours searching their books , and ‘SHOP SMALL’. 52 Prince St. (212) 274 -1160 Dekalb Market Check out the shipping container market offering 10% off select items from 5PM – 10PM. They’re also partnering with the Food Bank of New York City, so for every can of food you bring you get one raffle ticket to win over $500 worth of gifts from their vendors. 138 Willoughby St Brooklyn, NY 11201 Ear Inn This small pub is actually the oldest bar in NYC and has great burgers, too. Buy one drink get another for free ! Like magic! 326 Spring St. (212) 431-9750 Bedford Cheese Shop They say they’re not having any specials, but they’re a tiny and fabulously curated shop of cheeses, meats and imported goods, so give it a visit. You want to save the American economy, don’t you? 229 Bedford Avenue Brooklyn, NY 11211 Phone: 718.599.7588 Waterfalls Perhaps the greatest resto-gem in all of Brooklyn Heights. They serve truly delicious and cheap Middle Eastern fare, PLUS it’s BYOB. I mean, seriously — have you had their chicken? It is so good. They don’t need deals, they’re so affordable already. You ever feel stuffed and blissed out after a 40-dollar meal with four people? Didn’t think so. 144 Atlantic Avenue Brooklyn, NY 11201-6760 (718) 488-8886 Greenwich Letter Press This small stationary joint with great original designs is launching their holiday themed cards, so get in early! 39 Christopher Street Got a good tip on small shops to visit Saturday? Email us at nytips@huffingtonpost.com, or let us know in the comments below. For more great shops and deals, visit here .

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Coleen Rowley: Celebrating Spiritual Death on Black Friday

November 25, 2011

How many remember that this “Black Friday” marks the 10th anniversary of George Bush’s famous presidential advisory just after 9/11 for citizens to do their patriotic duty by pushing their worries aside and going shopping? The idea of asking the American people to make sacrifices in the face of the coming “War on Terror” was too ’70s, too Jimmy Carter. The 2001 attacks were quickly seized upon by hard-core propagandists and “shock doctrine” advocates as the “new Pearl Harbor,” sparking a decade of blatant social-psychological manipulation. The media onslaught has proved sadly effective in getting Americans to support the ongoing series of bloody and bankrupting wars and to overlook the root causes of this violence in today’s world. By incessantly pushing on the emotional hot-buttons of fear, hate, greed, false pride and blind loyalty (in that order), warmongers and flim-flam men have, since time immemorial, sought to bring out the worst in human beings. Up to now the propaganda has worked, persuading most Americans to accept with minimal visible coercion the enormous corruption and cruelty at the heart of the corporate-military-industrial-congressional-media complex. I’m embarrassed to admit that I played a small role back in late October 2001 in stoking the national shopping addiction, which worked so well to distract the American citizenry from looking closely at 9/11. At that time, the officially endorsed shopping compulsion served to prevent people from asking questions about how and why the attacks had occurred, and from paying full attention to the horrendously wrongheaded initial responses. These included the mass roundup of innocents; the establishment of indefinite, due process-free, Kafkaesque detention zones at Guantanamo and elsewhere; and the initial conspiracy to go to the “dark side” and resort to systematic torture — all of which served to morally bankrupt the United States. At that time, Minnesota’s Mall of America boasted of being the largest shopping complex in the world. Soon after 9/11, its stores, like others around the country, fell victim to the “Halloween terrorist threat hoax,” which mall owners feared, would scare off would-be shoppers. And so, as our FBI office spokesperson, I dutifully participated in a hastily organized press conference instigated by the Mall. I merely spoke the truth at the press conference, assuring the gathered media that the warning that terrorists would target malls in the United States was just a hollow rumor that had gone viral, without any real evidence or intelligence behind it. However, now that I see how American citizens are so routinely manipulated, I regret having contributed even in this small way to encouraging mindless consumption, which Bush, Rove and others pushed to keep people from questioning what they were doing. Stoking people’s addiction to shopping is primarily a function of the “greed button,” but the tactic also connects to the human frailties of indifference, complacency, false pride and blind loyalty. If one Googles images of “Black Friday” and “shop until you drop,” one finds numerous glossy ads and artistic renderings of pretty women carrying colorful packages and sacks. Actual photos of hyped-up throngs of shoppers waiting to rush through store doors intermingle with these cute shopper images. It makes us all want to feel the high that comes with buying mostly worthless stuff and joining in this materialist orgy. The malls have become like churches, desperately preaching an empty prosperity theology, which holds that purchasing consumer goods made in foreign sweatshops somehow demonstrates God’s blessing on American exceptionalism. Only a few dissidents, such as the Church of Stop Shopping Gospel Choir , are able to see that the shopping centers in their glitzy falsity mask true economic despair and spiritual poverty. American consumers largely fail to appreciate the immense irony in America’s massive decline in power accompanying their conversion to consumerism. U.S. foreign policy in the post WWII period aimed at essentially enforcing a global system in which the Western powers under American leadership would maintain global dominance. What this essentially meant was being in control of the world’s resources at the expense of non-Western nations. This fundamental objective of U.S. foreign policy in the post-war period was candidly admitted in a top-secret report written by them head of the State Department’s policy planning staff George Kennen, who wrote in February 1948: “We have about 50 per cent of the world’s wealth, but only 6.3 per cent of its population… Our real task in the coming period is to maintain this position of disparity… To do so we will have to dispense with all sentimentality and day-dreaming… We need not deceive ourselves that we can afford the luxury of altruism… We should cease to talk about vague, unreal objectives such as human rights, the raising of living standards, and democratization. The day is not far off when we will have to deal in straight power concepts.” Reality, however, is going in the opposite direction of the 1948 plans. In 2000, the U.S. controlled 31 percent of the world economy; by 2008, that figure had fallen to 23 percent and, according to the International Monetary Fund, the projection for 2013 is 21 percent. In the past decade, the United States has lost one-third of its economic wealth or, put another way, since 2000, the U.S. has lost nearly a third of its relative power in international politics while China’s has doubled and Russia’s has tripled. According to economic experts, this decline represents the largest drop in the history books. Our international decline was well under way before the economic downturn of 2008, which further weakened US influence. Whether you believe in “reap what you sow” or what the CIA terms “blowback,” the costly Iraq war, growing government debt and myriad unwise decisions resulting in economic weakness have cost the U.S. real power in today’s world. In fact, as we face individual and national bankruptcy, the malls have become for many Americans more a place to merely wander and lust than to actually buy. Large segments of the population have lost their jobs, health insurance and homes, and are so deeply in debt that when they surrender to the advertising-bred consumerist urge, they can only window shop, their credit cards rejected if they attempt to buy much of the stuff on display. Martin Luther King Jr. warned that a country in continuous war approaches spiritual death. I wonder if he realized that this extinction would play out in the nation’s shopping malls as, like the Romans, we distract ourselves with bread and circuses from the crimes and catastrophes that surround us, and the responsibilities we avoid. (By Coleen Rowley with editing assistance from Hugh Iglarsh. Rowley is a retired FBI agent and former Minneapolis Division Legal Counsel, also a 9-11 whistleblower. She joined the Church of Stop Shopping before it even was formed. Hugh Iglarsh is a writer/editor/citizen based in Chicago.)

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Richard Attias: Barack Obama at APEC: America Is Still Welcome

November 25, 2011

Although his remarks at the recent APEC CEO conference in Hawaii earlier this month were mostly serious, US President Barack Obama opened with a joke. “This is my birthplace, I know that was contested for a while,” he said. “I can show you the hospital if you’d like.” That matter dispensed with, he moved to weightier topics. Obama praised the outcomes that had been agreed on at the G20 summit earlier this month. “I was pleased to see that European leaders were taking seriously the need to solve not just the Greek crisis but also the broader European crisis,” he said. Like other speakers at the APEC CEO summit, he felt that the end is not quite in sight. “We’re not going to see massive growth in Europe till the problem is resolved. That will have a dampening effect on the overall economy.” But as long as the problems are contained, this presents an opportunity for growth for APEC. In a time when the rest of the world struggles, the Asia-Pacific region is more important to the US than ever before. Obama said he was happy with the progress of the Trans-Pacific Partnership. In such an extraordinarily diverse region it offers the potential to resolve trade issues of the past and those that may emerge in the future. If it succeeds, he thought that the TPP could be a model not just for the Asia-Pacific, but also for the wider world. On China, he accepted that some tensions continue, since the US, like many countries, both competes with China and wants to engage with it. The issues loom especially large in intellectual property, where America’s main advantage lies in its innovation and its patents. In this realm and in others like procurement and currency, China does not play fair. However, the President was supportive of the changes that are taking place in China. “We should be rooting for China to grow,” he suggested. “Now only does that present an enormous marketplace for American businesses and exports; but to see so many millions of people lifted out of poverty is a remarkable achievement.” He addressed some misperceptions about his administration’s activities, which he said he had noticed in the business press, arguing that he has issued fewer new regulations than the previous two governments. In addition, he said he has engaged in regulatory look-back, re-examining certain topics and removing rules that had become out of date. For the audience back home, Obama had one more message. There have been times when Americans may question their influence. This has been true over the past decade, during which the US has been involved in military conflicts and stricken by economic woes. “One of the things I’m encouraged about is the eagerness of countries to see the US re-engaged in this region,” he stated. American leadership is still welcomed, although the nature of that leadership may have shifted a little. “I am very proud of the leadership America has shown in the past but I also don’t want people to underestimate the leadership we are showing now,” he said. ‘We are poised to work in a spirit of mutual interest and mutual respect with countries around the world.”

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WATCH: Near Riot Ensue Over $2 Waffle Makers

November 25, 2011

Black Friday 2011 has seen its share of noteworthy, bargain-fueled madness. Shoppers lined up earlier than ever to take advantage of midnight openings and to get discounts at some stores that even opened on Thanksgiving Day. There have been reports of shoppers pepper spraying one another in the hunt for deals and even robbers shooting Black Friday customers to get their loot. And now, crazed shoppers reportedly got in a fight over $2 waffle makers at a Wal-Mart near Little Rock, Arkansas WBTV reports. After the video went viral, sites all across the web began to offer their commentary. Gawker wrote that the video embodies everything that’s “awesome” about America, including the “horrible economy, aggressive consumerism, mindless violence and a complete lack of concern for one’s fellow human beings.” Meanwhile, Reddit wonders if waffle makers could spawn a new slew of riots.

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Business Owner Posts Anti-Hiring, Anti-Obama Pledge

November 25, 2011

ASSOCIATED PRESS WACO, Ga. (AP) — A west Georgia business owner has been deluged with calls and emails after posting signs on his company’s trucks that say he’s not hiring anyone until President Barack Obama leaves office. Waco-based U.S. Cranes LLC owner Bill Looman tells WXIA-TV that reaction has been so intense he’s had to disconnect his phones and temporarily shut down the company’s website. He posted the signs on his company’s trucks for other motorists to see on roads and interstates across the South. The signs proclaim “New Company Policy: We are not hiring until Obama is gone.” Looman says he’s not refusing to hire employees to make a political point. He told WXIA he can’t afford to hire anyone because of the economy, and he blames the people in power. Video below via WXIA .

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Ex-Olympus CEO Says He’s Willing To Return To Disgraced Company

November 25, 2011

The British ex-CEO of Japan’s Olympus Corp emerged from a frosty meeting of directors on Friday convinced its board would eventually quit over an accounting scandal engulfing the firm, but he said he wasn’t “begging” to return and clean up the mess. Michael Woodford, still an Olympus director despite being fired as CEO and blowing the whistle over the scam, described the meeting as a tense encounter with no handshakes or apologies offered from the men who had sacked him barely a month ago. Instead, he said, the board had agreed that the once-proud maker of cameras and medical equipment should strive to avoid being delisted from the Tokyo stock exchange, a sanction that would make the business more vulnerable to takeover. “I just see a lot of suffering and misery for no gain,” Woodford said of the prospect of a delisting. “But we should have the investigation, it shouldn’t be fudged,” he told a news conference after the almost-two-hour meeting at Olympus’s Tokyo headquarters, where he was mobbed by reporters and TV crews as he entered and left the building. Woodford, back in Japan for the first time since fleeing the country right after his October 14 sacking, said there had been no talk at the meeting of him returning to his former post. “I’m not begging to come back,” he said, though he added that he was willing to do so if shareholders desired it. “I didn’t volunteer for this, I’m not a hero,” he added. “There was a tension in the room, but there seemed to be an understanding that it was in no one’s interest to raise the temperature,” he said. “They didn’t shake my hand and I didn’t offer mine. We said good morning and goodbye.” Major foreign shareholders have called for Woodford to be immediately reinstated, saying he can restore faith in the 92-year-old firm. The visit by Woodford, who also met this week with police and other investigators probing the scandal, coincided with a rally in Olympus shares, which have been buoyed by speculation the firm can escape delisting. The stock rose as much as 25 percent on Friday before closing up 8.6 percent at 1,107 yen. It has rebounded a whopping 77 percent in just four trading days, though it is still down more than half since the day before Woodford’s dismissal. Woodford said Olympus could survive as an independent entity as long as banks, so far supportive, kept backing it. DUBIOUS DEALS, CRIME SUSPICION Olympus had fired Woodford, a rare foreign CEO in Japan, alleging he had failed to adapt to Japanese culture and the company’s management style. Woodford says he was axed for questioning dubious merger and acquisition payments. Suspicion has swirled about possible links between the payments and organised crime. Woodford said he had no firm proof of gangster links but urged authorities to “follow the money.” “That would be concerning if organised crime was involved … but there’s no evidence of that to date,” he said. The 51-year-old freckle-faced Briton had left Japan after his dismissal citing concerns for his safety. Olympus first denied any wrongdoing, but later admitted it had hidden investment losses from investors for two decades and used some of $1.3 billion in M&A payments to aid the cover-up. Woodford said after Friday’s board meeting that the top priority was for Olympus to meet a December 14 deadline for filing its financial statements for the six-months to September — after which, he added, current management should go. The company would be automatically delisted if it misses the deadline. Even if it meets the deadline, the Tokyo Stock Exchange can still delist it, depending on the scale of past misstatements or if a link is found to “yakuza” gangsters. A third-party panel appointed by Olympus to look into the accounting scam said this week that it had not yet found any evidence of involvement by organised crime. AUDITORS, GOVERNANCE The Olympus affair has raised questions about whether its auditors, the Japanese arms of global giants KPMG and Ernst & Young, should have done more to follow up on red flags. KPMG’S chairman, Michael Andrew, on Friday called for a global set of standards for the auditing industry but said that KPMG had done the right thing in the actions it took pertaining to the Japanese company. “What is pretty evident to me is that it is a very, very significant fraud,” Andrew said in a speech in Hong Kong. “We should wait for the Japanese authorities to disclose that.” “I think it is very hard to jump to the conclusion that it’s a corporate governance failure,” he said. The scandal has also revived criticism of corporate governance in a country that Woodford said needed people who would “challenge and scrutinize.” He also took a swipe at mainstream Japanese media for being slow to cover the scandal. “What Japan should do is look around the world for the best human resources … It would be sad if no more gaijin come,” he said, using the Japanese word for foreigners. On the eve of the board meeting, two Olympus directors and an internal auditor blamed for the scandal quit and the president announced that current management was ready to step down once the firm’s recovery was on track. Current president Shuichi Takayama should stay until December 14, but changes could start thereafter, Woodford said, adding that his fellow directors seemed to realize they would have to go but had given no explicit commitment to resign. Woodford also said Japanese authorities probing the scandal, whom he met in Tokyo on Thursday, wanted to talk to him again. Tokyo police, prosecutors and regulators have launched a rare joint probe of the scandal. The U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation and Britain’s Serious Fraud Office are also looking into the affair. Shareholders have asked Olympus to seek more damages from former and current executives if they are found to have caused losses to company value through acquisitions at the center of a scandal, the company said in a statement on Friday. (Additional reporting by Yoko Kubota, Taiga Uranaka, Lisa Twaronite and Mayumi Negishi; Writing by Linda Sieg; Editing by Mark Bendeich) Copyright 2011 Thomson Reuters. Click for Restrictions .

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Michael Geist: Canadian Digital Lock Rules Are World’s Most Restrictive

November 25, 2011

The debate over C-11 resumed this week in the House of Commons with Paul Calandra, the parliamentary secretary to the minister of Canadian heritage, invoking a claim that raises the question of how the Canadian digital lock rules compare to those found in Europe. In response to the ongoing concerns with Bill C-11′s digital lock rules — they are easily the most discussed issue during the debates — Calandra stated : We know that in Europe there is much greater support for TPMs and that has not actually reduced the availability of content online. Does she have any rationale for thinking Canada’s less stringent use of TPMs through the bill would somehow reduce the availability of content for Canadian consumers? Calandra’s comments raise two issues: (1) whether Europe has stricter support for digital locks; and (2) whether digital locks reduce the availability of online content. The first issue is an important one since claims that Europe has stricter digital lock rules than those proposed in Bill C-11 are plainly inaccurate. Indeed, many Canadians would be far happier with the Bill C-11 digital lock rules if we matched some of the approaches found in Europe. European implementations include: Switzerland links circumvention to actual copyright infringement. Article 39a(4) includes a full exception for circumvention of TPMs for legal purposes, providing “the prohibition of circumvention can not be applied to People who are primarily circumventing for the purpose of a legal use.” Norway ‘s anti-circumvention law states that the provisions shall not “hinder private users in gaining access to legally acquired works on that which is generally understood as relevant playback equipment.” Finland ‘s law expressly permits circumvention for non-infringing uses of lawfully acquired copies. Lithuania ‘s anti-circumvention provisions include a specific exception that preserve personal use rights by requiring content owners to enable legitimate uses. The Czech Republic ‘s digital lock rules include a specific exception for digital archiving. Sweden ‘s implementation of anti-circumvention legislation tries to ensure access to court cases and government documents that are subject to TPMs. Denmark ‘s digital lock rules allow users to circumvent if the rights holder does not comply with an order from the Copyright License Tribunal to unlock for authorized purposes. Moreover, Denmark’s implementation includes an explanatory text that indicates that only TPMs used to prevent copying are protected. Accordingly, if a TPM seeks to expand protection beyond mere copyright protection it does not enjoy legal protection. For example, encoding DVDs with regional coding would presumably not enjoy protection, an interpretation confirmed by the Danish Ministry of Culture which has opined that it would not be unlawful to circumvent DVD regional encoding for lawfully acquired DVDs, nor to circumvent a TPM if the sole purpose is to use a lawfully acquired work. Italy ‘s digital lock rules require rights holders to allow users to exercise various exceptions found in its copyright legislation. Moreover, it includes the right to make one copy for personal use notwithstanding a TPM, provided that the work is lawfully acquired and the single copy does not prejudice the interests of the rights holder. Slovenia ‘s digital lock rules include an exception that allow circumvention for teaching purposes. Germany ‘s digital lock rules limit the coverage solely to works that are subject to copyright protection. Greece provides a positive right of access with the condition that failure to obtain the right leads first to mediation, followed by a legal right of action. Austria and the Netherlands have legislation that assumes access for non-infringing material — Austria has said it is “monitoring” the situation, while the Netherlands has included the ability for the Justice Minister to issue decrees on the matter. The second issue regarding reduced availability of online content is a bit odd since no one is claiming that the C-11 digital lock rules will reduce the availability of online content. The primary concern is that the rules prioritize locks and skew the copyright balance by allowing a rights holder to trump the rights of consumers merely by inserting a lock. To my knowledge, no one has suggested the rules will reduce the availability of content and Calandra’s repeated reference to this (he raised it in an earlier session) does not respond to an actual concern or point of criticism. In fact, the real concern — raised by dozens of Canadian organizations and all the opposition parties — is that the Canadian digital lock rules are more restrictive than those required by international law, more restrictive than those found in many other countries, and so restrictive that they undermine the government’s claims of striking a balance. Calandra’s references to other countries only serves to remind Canadians that the Bill C-11 digital lock rules are amongst the most restrictive in the world. This post was originally published on www.michaelgeist.ca .

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Crisis Rolls On: Now Hungary Downgraded To Junk

November 25, 2011

Hungary must redouble efforts to obtain International Monetary Fund aid and the central bank should raise rates to ease financing risks after Moody’s Investors Service cut the country’s credit grade to junk, said fund managers from Budapest to London.

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