Archive for March 14th, 2010
Euro zone industrial production in record growth in Jan
Industrial production in the euro zone exceeded expectations in January, posting growth of 1.7%, which represented the biggest monthly increase since records began in January 1990.
The increase boosted hopes that the 16-member bloc’s economic recovery is gathering pace.
It was recently revealed the euro zone economy grew by just 0.1% in the fourth quarter of [...]
China Is Gearing Up For A Major International Showdown With The US
China has succumbed to hubris. It has mistaken the soft diplomacy of Barack Obama for weakness, mistaken the US credit crisis for decline, and mistaken its own mercantilist bubble for ascendancy. There are echoes of Anglo-German spats before the First World War, when Wilhelmine Berlin so badly misjudged the strategic balance of power and over-played its hand.
Within a month the US Treasury must rule whether China is a “currency manipulator”, triggering sanctions under US law. This has been finessed before, but we are in a new world now with America’s U6 unemployment at 16.8pc.
Read the whole story at The Telegraph >
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See Also:
- Why UK Banks Are Bracing For Another Debt Crisis
- Bernanke’s Tightening Will Doom Us With Deflation
- The Greek Crisis Is A Dress Rehearsal For A Major Speculative Attack On The UK
US retail sales surprise in February
US retail sales grew unexpectedly in February by 0.3% after economists had predicted a fall of 0.2% due to bad weather, which gripped most of the country during part of the month.
According to the Commerce Department, the rise is the biggest since November, driven by hopes that economic recovery is gaining momentum.
The news resulted in [...]
Quote Of The Day, Pres. Rooselvelt Slams SCOTUS Edition: You Have The Spine Of A Banana Peel
First, there was Samuel Alito mouthing “Not true” at the State of the Union after President Barack Obama was more than clear about his displeasure of the Supreme Court’s Citizen United ruling.
And then this week Chief Justice John Roberts traveled to the University of Alabama to tell the students there that Obama making those remarks at the State of the Union while the justices had to sit there “expressionless” was “very troubling.”
It’s an odd back and forth, and one you do not usually see between the normally private and staid justices and the office of the President. Or so most of us thought.
When Jake Tapper, hosting ABC’s This Week, asked Obama advisor David Axelrod about the propriety of Obama’s State of the Union remarks, Axelrod told of the seriously tough criticism President Theodore Roosevelt doled out to Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes. Axelrod could not help himself from noting that John Roberts, “a student of history,” might be interested in the story.
Axelrod on This Week: You know, if [Roberts] looks back 100 years, Theodore Roosevelt said of Oliver Wendell Holmes after he made a decision on an antitrust case that he didn’t believe in, that Roosevelt thought was a bad decision, he said, I could carve out of a banana a judge with a stronger spine than him. So things have been said about justices by presidents in the past that were far more personal than anything the president said here.
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Steve Jobs Thinks Google Stole The iPhone Look And Feel (AAPL, GOOG, MSFT)
In Brad Stone and Miguel Helft’s NYT piece on Apple and Google, they say Apple’s feud with Google can be reduced to one key point of tension: The iPhone versus Android:
At the heart of their dispute is a sense of betrayal: Mr. Jobs believes that Google violated the alliance between the companies by producing cellphones that physically, technologically and spiritually resembled the iPhone. In short, he feels that his former friends at Google picked his pocket.
If this sounds familiar for Apple, there’s a reason. Just like Apple accused Microsoft of stealing its “look and feel” in the eighties, Apple is doing the same thing to Google. Except this time Apple is going after Google through HTC.
It appears Apple really is worried that the mobile battle could play out just like the desktop battle.
Anyway, this reminded us of the scene from Pirates of Silicon Valley where Steve Jobs (Noah Wylie) freaks out on Bill Gates (Anthony Michael Hall) and screams, “YOU’RE STEALING FROM US!”
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See Also:
- Is Apple Making The 1990s Mistake All Over Again? No Way, Says Gene Munster
- Hey, Apple, Wake Up — It’s Happening Again
- IT BEGINS: Apple Sues Google-Phone Maker HTC For Stealing iPhone Technology