There's no easy way to advertise cremation services.
So Australia's Just Cremations decided to go for broke with this jaw dropping promotion:?
BuzzFeed's Copyranter noted that this isn't Just Cremations' first odd ad. A Redditor posted this visual that Just Cremations placed on the back of the bus. Its message isn't as self explanatory.
imgur
Just Cremations isn't the only comedic cremation provider out there.
1 Iron made this strange spot for Schmidt & Bartelt Funeral Home in 2010, in which an old man declares, "I'd go in my easy chair if they'd let me."
keyboard shortcuts: ? previous photo ? next photo L view in light box F favorite < scroll film strip left > scroll film strip right ? show all shortcuts
France's court rules against the new 75 percent tax rate on incomes above??1 million, but not because of the rate, only because of the way it's applied. French Socialists can easily meet the objections with a new onerous tax on the rich.?
By Stefan Karlsson,?Guest blogger / December 31, 2012
French actor Gerard Depardieu, seen here entering his home in Paris earlier this month, says he is leaving France because 'success' is being punished with a 75 percent income tax on the rich. A French court has struck down the tax, but the ruling suggests it's only temporary.
Benoit Tessier/Reuters/File
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Apparently, a French court has struck down Socialist President Francois Hollande's new 75% tax rate on income above ?1 million,?something that some think means?that there won't be punitive taxation of the richest in France. However,?what the court actually objects to?isn't the high tax rate, but that it will be applied to individuals, instead of households as has been the rule in France. By applying it to individuals while continuing to otherwise tax households, two households with the same total income could end up paying different rates depending on how incomes are divided among members of those households, something that the court finds violates the equal treatment rule in the French constitution.
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This means that the Socialists are free to come up with a new tax proposal that applies a 75% tax on household income above ?1 million, and the government has indeed already that it plans to quickly introduce a new proposal that doesn't violate the equal treatment rule.
It is a shame for France that the court in fact didn't strike down the punitive taxation, and only objected to some technical details in the enacted proposal. Even using unrealistic static analysis, where behavior isn't affected, the tax would have only brought in ?210 million, a neglible sum (about 0.01% of GDP) in France's ?2 trillion economy And considering how it has driven away hundreds of rich Frenchman, including famous actor Gerard Depardieu to Belgium and other countries, and created negative PR for the French business climate, the tax is in fact a lot more likely to lower tax revenue rather than increase it.
The Christian Science Monitor has assembled a diverse group of the best economy-related bloggers out there. Our guest bloggers are not employed or directed by the Monitor and the views expressed are the bloggers' own, as is responsibility for the content of their blogs. To contact us about a blogger, click here. This post originally ran on stefanmikarlsson.blogspot.com.
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Weekend Highlights: More on the Apple/Samsung patent wars from Macworld UK and AppleInsider; Foss Patents reports that the ITC Judge wants Samsung to post a bond for 88 percent of its U.S. smartphone sales due to the Apple patent case; The Macalope considers small sample sizes; Insanely Great Mac updates a video review of results of charging iOS devices with the newest 12v charger, with interesting results; Rocco Pendola at TheStreet on the massive opportunity yet to be realized with Apple's million-dollar-per-day retail stores; MacNewsWorld's John Mello clarifies reports claiming Tim Cook's pay was cut 99%, when in actuality his base pay was raised by 51%; Macworld reviews the big Apple news stories of 2012; it seems that Apple's lack of online reviews are what brought down their online customer satisfaction score, which is still a respectable 80; $15 billion is what Samsung may be forced to pay for its attempt to ban Apple products in the EU; Apple had a huge Christmas according to Distimo, seeing an 87% increase in App Store downloads; report from Ina Fried over at AllThingsD says developers finding it more difficult to obtain app loyalty; Google's YouTube and Maps apps topped list of most downloaded apps on December 25th; former Apple designer reveals early product prototypes featuring some very interesting designs; LG seeking to ban Samsung's Galaxy Note for patent infringement; sending a quake of concern through ultrabook vendors, MacBook Air rumored to feature new processor platform in 2013 while retaining same design?reports in our Hardware/Software section; and apparently iDevice demand is so high that Apple's suppliers are going to keep working through the Chinese New Year; PC Magazine reviews Flickr for iPhone; PadGadget offers advice on finding accessories for your new iPad, iPad mini; Charles Moore discusses the pros/cons of buying Apple's extended AppleCare warranty for your devices; tablets now disposable commodity?
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"ITC judge recommends ban on Samsung devices infringing on Apple patents: Following an October preliminary finding, judge also approves design tweaks for Samsung." Ars Technica
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News
"BlueStacks now lets you run every Android app on Mac as it moves to beta"?9 to 5 Mac?9:11 AM
AppleCare/Troubleshooting
"Q&A: MacFixIt Answers/This week, readers e-mailed in questions about RAM prices for MacBook systems, resetting admin passwords, and more."?CNET Reviews?12/28
Reviews/How-To/Tips
"Corel AfterShot Pro vs Adobe Lightroom 4: Noise Reduction"?Foliovision?12/28
"Audirvana Plus audiophile music player (review)"?IT.Enquirer?12/28
"Favorite Mac Gems of 2012"?Macworld?12/28
"How to quickly set calendar times in OS X: If needed, you can take advantage of the OS X Calendar's ability to identify time frames to enter events faster."?MacFixIt?12/28
"How to Create a Keyboard Shortcut for Menu Items Everywhere"?Mactuts+?12/28
"Get Emoji Definitions Quickly in iOS"?OS X Daily?12/28
"Let's Talk About One-Trick Pony Apps For Your Mac (the app that's always on top)"?NoodleMac?12/28
"How An App Makes Your Mac Faster And Makes Your Battery Last Longer"?BohemianBoomer?12/28
"A Simple, Inexpensive Way To Create Subtitles Or Captions On Your Movies"?McSolo?12/28
"Is There A Simple, Easy, Inexpensive Way To Hide Files And Folders On A Mac?"?Mac 360?12/28
"How This Clever, Free App Can Help You Become A Mac Power User"?TeraTalks?12/28
Op/Ed
"Stupidity That's Hereditary"?Rixstep?12/28
"Why Apple does cloud computing right."?PalmAddict?12/28
Press Releases
"GraphicConverter 8.5 Adds Retina, 16-bit Grayscale RAW Support, More"?FairerPlatform?12/28
"Bluestacks App Player brings 750,000 Android apps to OS X"?T3?12/28
"Zevrix Extends 50% Holiday Sale until January 5 for All Products"?prMac?12/28
"A learning strategy: Sheboygan Area Shool District plans to proVide an iPad to every 6th-grader"?Sheboygan Press?7:00 AM
"iPhone and iPad sales: Two Christmas Day data points/1) 17 million iOS and Android devices activated; 2) App Store downloads up 87%"?Fortune?12/28
"Apple's Christmas gift - an 87 percent rise in app downloads"?CNET News?12/28
"iPad continues to lead the tablet market in web traffic"?SlashGear?12/28
"Report: iPad Still Destroying Other Tablets in Web Usage"?Mashable?12/28
"Huge iOS and Android Activity on Christmas Day"?Forbes?12/28
"It's Getting More Costly for iPhone App Makers to Get Loyal Customers"?AllThingsD?12/28
"Apple sees big slide in customer satisfaction"?TG Daily?12/28
"Analyst: Apple may have to pay for 'iPhone' name in Brazil"?Electronista?12/28
"YouTube, Google Maps top list of most download apps on Christmas Day"?iDownload Blog?12/28
"Apple designer shows off early prototypes in new book"?Electronista?12/28
"Early Apple Computer And Tablet Designs Reveal The iMac And iPad That Might Have Been"?TechCrunch?12/28
"How Apple's holistic approach to design began back in 1982"?Ars Technica?12/28
"Upcoming book gives look at early Apple designs"?CNET News?12/28
"Apple Computer Designs That You've Never Seen [Video]?Mashable?12/28
"Japanese mobile carriers beg users to limit New Year's texts, calls"?IDG News Service?12/28
"Ouya game consoles now on their way to developers"?CNET News?12/28
"OUYA Ships 1,200 Development Consoles, Shows Off Its Pre-Release Android Gaming Hardware On Video"?TechCrunch?12/28
"Mobile gift cards increase in popularity"?Financial Times [Paid Membership Required]?12/28
"Schools use smart devices to help make kids smarter"?USA Today?12/28
"All is well after Zuckerberg photo flap"?CNN?12/28
"Bug reveals 'deleted' Snapchat videos"?BBC?12/28
"Kim Dotcom To Host Mega's Launch Event At His New Mega Zealand Mansion Next Month"?TechCrunch?12/28
"DotCom promises splashy launch for Mega"?CNET News?12/28
"Report: Fujitsu President Says Windows 8 Demand Weak, Intros New Smartphone"?PC Magazine?12/28
"Weak Windows 8 Demand Saps PC Sales, Fujitsu President Says"?Bloomberg?12/28
"Cisco, HP, Walmart, others support Judge Posner, propose methodologies for patent damages"?Foss Patents?12/28
"Android-Android war raging in Korea as LG seeks injunction against Samsung Galaxy Note 10.1"?Foss Patents?12/28
Publications/Podcasts
"Hartmut Esslinger's Upcoming Book Reveals Early Apple Designs"?Design Trend?12/29
"Gene Steinberg meets Peter Cohen, from The Loop and the Angry Mac Bastards radio show, and Kirk McElhearn, Macworld's 'iTunes Guy,' this week on The Tech Night Owl LIVE!"?The Tech Night Owl LIVE?12/28
"New iPads In March And Our iOS 7 Hopes And Dreams On Our All-New CultCast"?Cult of Mac?12/28
"Podcast: End of Year Review - 2012 Apple products plus Holiday wrap up"?Insanely Great Mac?12/28
"Steve Wozniak praises panorama app that spins iPhone: Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak has become the latest fan of a new iPhone app that uses the phone's vibrate function to create Video panoramas."?Telegraph?7:01 AM
"Apple iWatch: latest rumours suggest a wearable revolution/Chinese news sites claim Apple's iWatch would use Intel chips and proVide a new interface for the best-selling iPhone."?Telegraph?6:43 AM
"Apple to Update MacBook Pro and MacBook Air in June 2013 with New Processors, All Retina?"?MacRumors?12/28
"Here Come New, More Powerful Versions Of Apple's Best Computer, The MacBook Air"?Business Insider?12/28
"Suppliers hint at changes to MacBook Air -- Digitimes"?CNET News?12/28
"Rumor: New MacBook Pro and MacBook Air Due In June 2013"?Apple Bitch?12/28
"Apple Suppliers To Continue Work During Chinese New Year To Meet High Market Demand"?App Advice?12/28
"Strong demand prompts Apple suppliers to work during Chinese New Year"?AppleInsider?12/28
"'Insatiable demand' for iPad mini drives stock-outs in China"?AppleInsider?12/28
"iPad mini in hot demand in China -- analyst"?CNET News?12/28
AppleCare/Helps
"I have a little later (mid-year vintage) model of that machine and so far am having no issues. However, there are some things to try and sleuthing to do. I would first try two things: Try resetting the PRAM and the SMC. There are instructions for both procedures all over the place. Also, determine if this happens only when the 9400 is involved, or does it happen with the 9600 (or with both). Are there any console messages that occur just prior to the panic? What software is running at the time of the crash? Do you recall installing any particular software or attaching any special hardware just prior to this syndrome beginning?"?MacInTouch?12/28
Price Trackers/Deals
"Fruitopia For iPhone Is Temporarily Available For Free (Normally $0.99)"?Apple Sliced?12/29
"World of Blocks For iPhone Is Free Right Now (Previously $0.99)"?Apple Sliced?12/29
"ORBITAL HD For iPad Is Free Today (Was $2.99), The iPhone Version Is Also Free"?Apple Sliced?12/29
"Apple drops prices on refurbished Mac Minis by $50, now start at $469"?9 to 5 Mac?12/29
"Defender II For iPhone and iPad Is Temporarily Available For Free (Normally $0.99)"?Apple Sliced?12/28
"LensFlare For iPhone and iPad Is Free Right Now (Previously $0.99)"?Apple Sliced?12/28
"Puzz For iPad Is Free Today (Was $1.99)"?Apple Sliced?12/28
"15" MacBook Pro Prices & Sales"?MacPrices?12/28
"13" MacBook Pro Prices & Sales"?MacPrices?12/28
"MacBook Air Prices & Sales"?MacPrices?12/28
"PadGadget Daily App Deal ? 80 iPad Apps on Sale"?PadGadget?12/28
"2012 iPod touch Deals: New from $185, Refurbished from $129"?FairerPlatform?12/28
Deal Brothers Daily Deal: Attention Merchants: MasterCard and VISA may cost you more than AmEx
"AirPort Express Setup Failure: Is 2012 the Year of the Lemon?"?Kirkville?6:57 AM
"Dammit, I'm a doctor, not an iPhone! Medical breakthrough of 2013? Tricorders"?New York Post?6:44 AM
"Steve Jobs Isn't The Only Kind Of Artist Leader"?Forbes?12/29
"Google's big push to make better iOS apps than Apple"?GigaOM?12/29
"What Is an iPhone? My dumbphone experiment takes an unexpected twist."?Technology Review?12/29
"Type 'sell' into Google Finance and take a bite out of Apple: It's not clear why, exactly, this is happening, but as of this writing, if you type 'sell' into Google Finance, you get Apple's rather sullen stock chart. Algorithmic slip-up? Or gremlinesque Android?"?CNET News?12/29
"Top Comments: The Problems with Facebook, Windows and Apple"?Mashable?12/29
"Apple And Google Race For Black Gold"?Forbes?12/29
"ITC judge recommends ban on Samsung devices infringing on Apple patents: Following an October preliminary finding, judge also approves design tweaks for Samsung."?Ars Technica?12/29
"Loss Of Apple'S Processor Business Unlikely To Affect Samsung"?BGR?12/28
"Attempts to ban Apple devices could see Samsung fined $15 billion"?TUAW?12/28
"The Sad Tale of Two Apple Audio Players"?512 Pixels?12/28
"Apple's iPad Generates 87% of Pre-Xmas Tablet Web Traffic"?The Mac Observer?12/28
"Man Bites Dog: China Fines Apple for Copyright Infringement"?TechNewsWorld?12/28
"China iPad mini Demand Called 'Insatiable"?Tapscape?12/28
"Sorry folks, book publishers don't know Apple's plans"?TUAW?12/28
"Rethinking The Mobile App 'Walkthrough'"?TechCrunch?12/28
"The Year of Doom For Microsoft, Google and Apple"?Forbes?12/28
"Why I Might Drop the iPhone 5 for the Galaxy Note II, and you should too." ["All in all, Apple has fallen behind the curve. After trying the Galaxy Note II for two weeks, it's clear that Android Jellybean (4.1) has managed to pull ahead. And the second iteration of the Note ? a device I've made fun of since before it even made it to the shelves ? is a far better phone, semantically and as a competitive computer."]?Forbes?12/28
"Are tablets now disposable computing devices? Summary: With the price of 7" tablets now reaching the sub-$200 level, should they be considered disposable computing devices?"?ZDNet?12/28
"Can the N.Y. Times ride Apple all the way to a Pulitzer? Part 9 in its iEconomy series, published Thursday, is the hammer that tries to nail it"?Fortune?12/28
"Social networks, Apple, Microsoft and Linux in 2013"?The Inquirer?12/28
"Looking back at my Apple-related predictions for 2012"?AppleDailyReport?12/28
"Shut Up, You're Not Apple"?Forbes?12/28
"Is AppleCare extended warranty coverage worth the money?"?AppleTell?12/28
"[Wayne] The tech I used most in 2012"?BetaNews?12/28
"The Most Disturbing New Trend For Apple Customers In 2012"?PixoBebo?12/28
Non-Apple
"Silicon Valley conquers Hollywood 2013 ? Setting the scene"?I, Cringely?6:55 AM
"Tech's biggest misfires of 2012"?Engadget?6:54 AM
"The Wii U Is The Nintendo'S Last Console"?BGR?12/28
"5 common computer problems you can fix yourself"?USA Today?12/28
"Raspberry Pi Hack Turns The Ultra-Affordable Computer Into An AirPlay Receiver"?TechCrunch?12/28
"ASUS Matrix Radeon HD 7970 Platinum Review"?HotHardware?12/28
"16 of the most useful cloud management tools"?Network World?12/28
"Digitimes Research: Loss of Apple processor orders unlikely to affect Samsung"?DigiTimes?12/28
"Zuckerberg Photo Flap: 4 Lessons/What Randi Zuckerberg's 'private' Facebook photo -- and subsequent Twitter fuming -- can teach the rest of us about social business."?InformationWeek?12/28
"Tips to help your smartphone work better" [Video Report]?CNET News?12/28
"Can New BlackBerries Help Save Research in Motion?" [Video Report]?TheStreet?12/28
"Google Music Scan and Match swaps explicit songs for clean tracks"?TG Daily?12/28
"2 Tech Moments of 2012 That Made You Say 'WTF?'"?Wired Magazine?12/28
"2012: The tech year in cartoons/From SOPA to the Petraeus affair, here's a look at some of the year's biggest IT stories from the pen of Computerworld's editorial cartoonist, John Klossner."?Computerworld?12/28
"Mobile's Biggest Losers In 2012: The last twelve months have been turbulent for smartphone makers and wireless network providers. Here's who took it on the chin hardest."?InformationWeek?12/28
"Drones, phones and other 2012 privacy threats"?Computerworld?12/28
"The top 10 trends in enterprise cloud for 2013"?VentureBeat [Free Registration Required]?12/28
"Security in 2013: The rise of mobile malware and fall of hacktivism"?PCWorld?12/28
"2012''s worst security exploits, fails and blunders"?PCWorld?12/28
"10 Biggest Information Security Stories Of 2012: From John McAfee's escape from Belize to the privacy debacle that compromised CIA director Petraeus' career, 2012 had no shortage of security shockers."?InformationWeek?12/28
"Video games in 2012: A year of high-octane sequels"?Washington Post [Free Registration Required]?12/28
"How Amazon ruined my Christmas: Netflix's Christmas outage is yet another reminder that downtime happens at the worst possible time and the cloud is not inherently resilient."?ZDNet?12/28
"Could These 6 Pending Regulations Destroy The Internet In 2013?"?ReadWrite?12/28
"After initial flop, does Google+ have a secret weapon for a comeback?"?Beatweek Magazine?12/28
"Seriously, Google? Really? How Google's Math Kills The Web As You Know It"?Mac 360?12/28
"AUTONOMY UPDATE: Lynch Junks Accounting Fraud Allegations as US Investigation Underway"?FxPips.com?12/29
"HP Confirms Subsidiary Autonomy Being Probed By Justice Department"?redOrbit?12/29
"Autonomy's Lynch rejects fraud claims as US probe is launched: Firm's founder hits back at HP"?Irish Independent?12/29
"US Justice Department looks into HP's Autonomy acquisition"?PCWorld?12/29
"Fujitsu president blames poor sales on 'weak' Windows 8 demand: Windows 8 becoming a scapegoat?"?TechRadar UK?12/29
"Windows 8 wrestles with PC's legacy: opinion On a traditional PC, Windows 8 Metro is a solution looking for a problem."?CNET Reviews?12/29
"Can Microsoft Go Pro in Tablets in 2013?"?DailyFinance?12/29
"Short Microsoft? No, Just Buy The Dips Of This Solid DiVidend Stock"?Seeking Alpha?12/29
"Kabini to be 10 percent faster than 28nm Bobcat"?Fudzilla?12/29
"Intel's Cable TV Service And Set Top Box Will Soon Roll Out City By City"?TechCrunch?12/29
"Intel Reportedly plans to launch its internet TV service in a limited number of cities"?The Verge?12/29
"Intel's 'Redhookbay' Spotted in Benchmarks with Android 4.2.1, Dual-Core CPU"?Softpedia?12/29
"Intel Redhookbay benchmarks surface, show dual-core Merrifield processor"?SlashGear?12/29
"Intel postpones Haswell launch until Computex"?Hardware.info?12/29
"Intel Haswell possibly delayed till June 2013"?Tech2?12/29
"Intel Haswell CPUs delayed until June 2013"?CPU World?12/29
"US judge SLAMS both IBM and the SEC over bribery settlement"?The Register?12/29
"4 Reasons Cisco Will Be The #1 IT Company"?Seeking Alpha?12/29
"HP Goes Radio Silent Into 2013 on Autonomy Debacle"?TheStreet?12/28
"HP confirms DOJ investigation into Autonomy acquisition: HP said in a regulatory filing with the SEC that it has provided information to U.S. and U.K. authorities"?IDG News Service?12/28
"Hewlett-Packard Says Justice Department Probing Autonomy"?Bloomberg?12/28
"HP discloses US probe into Autonomy"?Financial Times [Paid Membership Required]?12/28
"H-P Confirms DOJ Probe Over Autonomy Mess"?FOXBusiness?12/28
"HP-Autonomy acquisition under US govt investigation"?ZDNet?12/28
"Autonomy's Lynch defends record as HP confirms Federal probe"?Reuters?12/28
"HP Has Been Slammed With 10 Lawsuits Over The Autonomy Debacle"?Business Insider?12/28
"Year in Review: Windows 8, roadmaps, Office Next top the reader charts"?ZDNet?12/28
"You need a touchscreen for Windows 8: Windows 8's best feature isn't being used by most Windows 8 PC owners."?CNNMoney?12/28
"Intel to cooperate with HP, Lenovo, Quanta, Compal to launch smart TVs in 2013"?DigiTimes?12/28
"This Dumb Year: The 57 Lamest Moments in Tech 2012"?Techland?12/28
"2012: The year in application development/Native vs. Web, the rise of GitHub, hard truths for HTML5 -- here's a look back at the year in programming trends" [Slideshow]?InfoWorld?12/28
"Top 10 Tech News Stories of 2012: From Apple vs. Samsung to Facebook's IPO, here's what had the tech world talking in 2012."?PC Magazine?12/28
(Reuters) - A woman who made self-incriminating statements is in custody in the death of a man pushed in front of an oncoming New York City subway train, police said on Saturday, the second such fatality this month for one of the world's busiest subway systems.
Detectives took a 31-year-old Hispanic woman into custody, a police spokesman told Reuters. Police said the woman, whom they did not name, made statements implicating herself.
The investigation is continuing, and charges are pending, the spokesman said.
Witnesses told police a woman appeared to be mumbling to herself and pacing Thursday evening before she approached an unsuspecting man from behind on the platform of an elevated station in the borough of Queens.
She then shoved him onto the subway track as the train pulled into the station, witnesses said.
Police identified the victim as Sunando Sen. It is the second death this month of a New York subway rider pushed onto the tracks of the city's more than 100-year-old subway system.
On December 3, Ki-Suck Han was killed after being shoved onto subway tracks in Manhattan as a train entered the 49th Street station near Times Square. A suspect, Naeem Davis, has been charged with second-degree murder.
Including Thursday's incident, 139 people have been struck by New York City subway trains so far in 2012, and 54 of them died, a Metropolitan Transportation Authority spokesman said on Friday. He said the tally was preliminary and subject to change.
After shoving Sen on Thursday, the woman ran from the station to the street in a scene caught on surveillance video footage that police released on Friday as they searched for her.
Police said on Friday it remained unclear whether she knew the victim, whom they initially had trouble identifying because his body had been so badly mangled by the train.
(Reporting by Colleen Jenkins; Editing by Alex Dobuzinskis and Vicki Allen)
(CNN) ? A circus producer said Friday that an animal rights group has paid it $9.3 million to settle two federal court cases claiming elephant abuse.
Feld Entertainment, Inc., trumpeted the settlement with the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (ASPCA) as a victory for its Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus.
?These defendants attempted to destroy our family-owned business with a hired plaintiff who made statements that the court did not believe,? said Kenneth Feld, chairman and CEO of Feld Entertainment, in a statement.
?Animal activists have been attacking our family, our company, and our employees for decades because they oppose animals in circuses,? Feld said. ?This settlement is a vindication not just for the company but also for the dedicated men and women who spend their lives working and caring for all the animals with Ringling Brothers in the face of such targeted, malicious rhetoric.?
The ASPCA was one of several animal rights groups that sued Feld Entertainment in 2000, alleging that circus elephants were abused.
Both parties filed dismissal papers in U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia. The matter has been in litigation for more than a decade.
The ASPCA confirmed the settlement, saying in a statement that ?the organization does not admit to any liability or wrongdoing.? The court never ruled on the merits of the elephant abuse allegations, it said.
?After more than a decade of litigating with Feld Entertainment, the ASPCA concluded that it is in the best interests of the organization to resolve this expensive, protracted litigation,? said ASPCA President and CEO Ed Sayres in the statement.
Feld?s cases, which include allegations of litigation abuse and racketeering, will continue against the other defendants ? the Humane Society of the United States, the Fund for Animals, the Animal Welfare Institute, the Animal Protection Institute United with Born Free USA and Tom Rider, a former circus employee who testified against Ringling Bros.
U.S. District Judge Emmett G. Sullivan deemed Rider?s testimony tainted because he had been paid by animal rights activists and did not have standing to sue.
?The court finds that Mr. Rider is essentially a paid plaintiff and fact witness who is not credible, and therefore affords no weight to his testimony regarding the matters discussed herein, i.e., the allegations related to his standing to sue,? he wrote in a December 2009 opinion.
CNN was not able to reach Rider on Friday.
ASPCA spokeswoman Elizabeth Estroff would not comment on specifics of the case.
Friday?s settlement did not placate Wayne Pacelle, president and CEO of the Humane Society of the United States.
?While HSUS was not a party to the original case against Ringling, we agree with so many critics of the circus that its treatment of elephants is deplorable and unacceptable. We?ll continue to make our case to the public, even as Ringling files frivolous and retaliatory legal actions to divert and distract from its abuse of elephants,? he said in a statement.
John Simpson, lead counsel for Feld and a partner at Fulbright & Jaworski in Washington, said Feld?s legal costs since July 2000 have exceeded $20 million, but that settlements with other defendants may be reached.
?We?re going to see this through to conclusion, whether it ends in a verdict or whether it ends in a settlement,? he said in a telephone interview. ?But they know where to find me.?
The toll of the case has gone beyond a financial one, he said. ?It gets very personal and nasty out there on the line when the company?s employees are handling the elephants in public on walks,? he said. ?I think the people who have cared for these animals have suffered and been unjustly accused.?
If I should die or lose my WordPress password tomorrow, I'd be satisfied with this post being the last thing you've ever read from me.
Because what is the point of publishing 6500 blog posts (as I have) if you can't crystallize and document the most important lessons learned on a regular basis? I think I've distilled everything I've chronicled this year into the six most important lessons for investors. Other years there are other lessons taught, but this is the knowledge you should be walking away with after 2012:
1. Sometimes there's no one left to buy
This is a very old lesson but a crucial one. When everyone's already in, where are the buyers going to come from?
Over the summer, Apple became the Jesus Stock; no one would ever sell it but, unfortunately, anyyone who could buy it and wanted to buy it had already done so. It had become the greatest Hedge Fund Hotel stock of all time, a massive weighting in all the large cap indexes and an institutional as well as a retail "darling", one of the most widely-held investments in the world. I was at the Ira Sohn conference when David Einhorn announced to a breathless audience of a few thousand asset managers that Apple was his next big pick. It was worth just over $500 billion and Einhorn explained how he had called both the NYSE and the Nasdaq and neither one of them had a restriction against it being worth a trillion.
It was lights out ever since that moment...
Apple has since lost more than $170 billion in market capitalization, a larger dollar amount than the total market caps of the 54 smallest companies in the S&P 500 combined.? Without any Apple enthusiasts left to come in and buy, and absent a decent-sized short interest, there were no natural buyers and a whole host of tax-motivated sellers who'd ridden the stock for a decade, racking up 8000% returns. Oh well.
2. Sometimes there's no one left to sell
Research in Motion's story this fall? was the antithesis of what we saw with Apple. The stock hit six bucks a share, almost a complete and total wipeout of the company's value. But then the market spoke in early September. It said, "Maybe this company is not long-term viable and cannot compete with Apple and Android - but it will not die now. No sir, not on this day." RIMM more than doubled to 14 within a few weeks, a monster return from the depths that happened concurrently with the Apple bludgeoning from 705 to 500.
Take everything you thought you knew about platforms and handsets and technology and throw it out the window, this was about supply and demand, not who had the better product. Just as there was no one left to buy Apple, below 10 dollars a share there wasn't a soul left who would sell their Research In Motion.
Sear the memory of this into your hippocampus.
3. Things change quickly
Let's take a time machine back to the end of 2011 and lay out what we believe will be the top performing equity plays for 2012. Let's tell people the financials, especially the large cap banks, will lead the S&P 500 along with the homebuilder stocks against a backdrop of still-record foreclosure activity, increasing regulation, horrible employment and wage growth stats, etc. Then let's tell them that recessionary - bordering on depressionary - Europe will be the home of the hottest equity markets on earth, with Germany running up 30% by year-end.
What sort of response do you think we'd have gotten to a forecast like that a year ago? Probably slapped across our fat faces with a Scotch salmon wrapped in newspaper. Laughed out of the building, dog.
But things change - in 2012, the?Dow Jones U.S. Home Construction Index was up an amazing 78%, the Financials were the best performing of the 10 S&P Sectors (up 26%) and Europe's main index, the Stoxx 600, is up a solid 15% for the year, over 20% from its June low.
This spring I watched as Jeff Gundlach unveiled his now-legendary pairs trade - short Apple versus a 10X bet on natural gas - the crowd was incredulous, Apple was trading vertically higher after all and nat gas was well on its way to zero.? Turns out that was the trade of the year. Know this - safe can be risky and risky can be safe in the blink of an eye. And mean reversion is always in the on-deck circle, playa.
4. Trends can and will persist past the point of sanity
Let's consider that US 10-year Treasury bonds have been yielding around 1.7% for most of the year while the annual run rate of inflation is 2.2%, thus guaranteeing a destruction of purchasing power for the holders. This bond binge continuing despite a growing economy, low stock volatility and no major systemic disruption in the markets at the moment is quite a thing to behold. Investors spent the year continuously pulling money from stocks to flood the bond market like the animated broomsticks in Fantasia with their buckets sloshing about. It makes no sense, but betting against it has been a loser.
How long can these trends go one while everyone agrees they shouldn't?? Ask some of the geniuses who've been entangled in the Short-Japanese Government Bonds (JGBs) "widowmaker trade". The answer is almost forever, and you will capitulate just before the turn. Of course you will.
5. "Uncertainty" is a buy signal, not a sell signal
When you hear the term "uncertainty" being bandied about from every corner of the universe, you may want to consider putting in some buy orders. Let's take Greece. How much uncertainty was there about the oft-lamented Mediterranean problem child nation? The maximum. There could not have been more. Each day, the discussion was about when (not if) they would leave the Euro Zone, would they voluntarily withdraw or would they be kicked out, how may millions of people would starve on the streets when it happened and who would be next.
And while all these motherfuckers were busy blabbing away about the "Fate of Greece" the Athens Stock Exchange decided to rally 34% this year, doubling the returns of the S&P 500, Switzerland, France, the Emerging Markets index, the Asia Pacific region and just about everything else in sight. Your passing, superficial knowledge of the risk factors of a given thing, gleaned from newspapers and television and repeated ad nauseum by a million wannabe pundits and newsletter writers, are priced in. Tell me something I don't know.
Uncertainty is why Wilbur Ross gets to buy up the nation's entire complex of bankrupt coal and steel plants in the 1990's while no one else would even think about it. It's why Dan Loeb can buy a billion dollars worth of Greek bonds in August and sell them for a $500 million profit four months later.
Uncertainty is how kings are made.
6. Usually, the asteroid misses earth
Markets usually climb a Wall of Worry they say. Let me tell you something - investors of other eras don't even know the meaning of the term Wall of Worry.
The shit we've had to listen to and worry about this year all at once will be looked back on someday by a future generation and marveled at. China's hard landing, the break-up of the Euro, the Fiscal Cliff and on and on. This is to say nothing of the collapse of the largest commodities brokerages, the London Whale, the LIBOR scandal, Lloyd Blankfein totally nude, the loss of trusted reporter Kelly Evans to England, etc. Some of the top veteran hedge fund managers threw the towel in this year, for no reason other than they had had enough, and possessed no explanation for what they were supposed to be saying or doing anymore. The emotions, the intellectual incongruity of the whole thing, it was just gut-wrenching and the fun - if ever it was fun - had been wrung out of it. Even Wall Street's full-of-shit Chief Strategist promotion machine struggled this year, a record amount of bearishness had crept into their forecasts and estimates - something we almost never see.
If you've traded and invested this year and came out okay, then you are to be commended, this was a tough one no matter what the index statistics say. Nerve-wracking doesn't even come close as a descriptor - we were Riverdancing on a frozen-over pond with steel-tipped boots and ice sharks swimming below the cracking surface just waiting for us to fall through. And those ice sharks had some kind of weird fish syphilis.
The asteroid certainly seemed to have been getting closer at various moments, but alas, the end of the world was not to be. I'm protectively shielding my crotch with one hand as I write this, wincing at the thought of an immediate boot-kick from any of the disasters we've managed to skate past.
But once again, the asteroid missed earth in 2012. We are alive and live to fight another year, much to the chagrin of basement-dwelling misanthropes and grumpy old men everywhere. To the fear-mongers: I'm so sorry your apocalypse was staved off another twelve months, better luck in 2013, bitches
To everyone else - those of us who are investing for prosperity and for the future, I'll say that it's been an honor serving in the trenches with you this year. Sometimes we traded together and sometimes we had opposing positions on. But always, we did our best to remain constructive and to make sense of the news and the data and the action on our screens. And now we're that much smarter and tougher, wizened and battle-tested, for the new year to come.
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The winter season is here and womens fashions have delivered a range of styles to suit most tastes. Unlike previous season, in which plus size women in particular have been penalised by Dame Fashion for not having certain tastes or not looking good in certain cuts, the AW 2012 season has put together what is almost a hit parade of previous fashion favourites from nearly a century?s worth of styles, cuts and colours.
The womens fashion clothes on offer for the AW 2012 season range from highly coloured late 20th Century prints to delicate, sombre mid-century dresses and from high Victoriana to understated 21st Century cool. From peplum to chiffon, from floaty to figure hugging, there?s a combination for every lady as the party season gets under way again.
Plus sized fashions this year combine a number of looks and feels ? including the two tone look popularised by the world?s favourite plus size beauty, Christina Hendricks. Ever since being voted World?s Sexiest Woman in a poll of the readers of an influential and well-known male interest magazine, Christina has reminded us all why the bountifully proportioned girl is the one we all love. This year?s fashions pay homage to some of her outfits in hit TV show ?Mad Men? ? as well as to the years and styles that have formed some of our most enduring impressions of retro cool.
This year?s womens fashion clothes include 50s style dresses, Edwardian style dresses and even a return to the loudness of the 80s and 90s with some delicious outfits that remind us of the times without repeating their fashion crimes (so, no massive shoulder pads, for example!). The modern retro look does what retro does best ? taking the spirit of an era without actually replicating the materials and cuts it used to be famous for.
For the plus sized lady, the most complementary fashions are the 50s style dresses, modern floating dresses (which also have a late Victorian Gothic look to them) and of course, the classic jeans and jacket look ? which can be stunning on a lady with generous hips and chest measurements.
As a plus sized lady, you will already know what styles suit you the best. Make the most of our peplum dress for the hourglass figure featured with a heavier waist ? perfect for most occasions from parties to work. Or balance a top heavy figure with a jacket and trousers. Wearing the cut of the trousers loose from midthigh down can reinstate balance to the silhouette of a lady whose upper deck is notably bigger than the rest of her.
The clothes you choose need to express your personality as well as your fashion sense. That?s why the AW 2012 selection is so exciting. For the first time in a long time, you?re able to really combine your personal style with the styles available to you on the high street and from the internet sites you use. AW 2012 womens fashion clothes represent the widest selection of tastes and styles seen on the street in a long time.
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Summary
AW 2012 womens fashion clothes represent the widest selection of tastes and styles seen on the street in a long time.
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