http://www.buzzfeed.com/buzzfeedpolitics/romney-the-barbarian

http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/finance/2012/0117/1224310358138.html

INVESTORS IN Europe shrugged off Standard and Poor’s much-anticipated downgrading of nine euro zone countries, as stock markets in Europe swung into positive territory from mid-morning.

There were no hiccups at an auction of French debt, as France’s borrowing costs fell. French bonds gained as the country auctioned �1.895 billion in one-year securities at a yield of 0.406 per cent, compared to 0.454 per cent at a sale of similar-maturity securities earlier this month. The European Central Bank was also active in the bond market yetsterday, buying Italian and Spanish government debt.

Having earlier downplayed the Standard and Poor’s move, the Sarkozy administration also received a boost from ratings agency Moody’s yesterday, which announced it had decided to retain its triple-A rating on French sovereign debt.

Meanwhile, in a speech in Paris, French central bank governor Christian Noyer said Standard and Poor’s decision to strip France and Austria of their triple-A status and downgrade an additional seven euro zone countries late on Friday evening was an “additional challenge” for the region, but that the 17 member states that share the single currency have the “right strategy” for tackling the debt crisis.

The euro hit a near 17-month low against the dollar and an 11-year low against the yen in early tradeover that the mass downgrades would damage the lending capacity of the euro zone’s bailout fund.However, it recovered its early losses, with some of the gains attributed to speculators taking profits on their short positions on the currency.

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'NEW YORK - Almost three years ago, Peerless Industries Inc, a United States-based maker of audio-visual mounting solutions, made an unusual decision - it pulled its production out of China to build a new plant in the US. The company predicted that its production costs in China would eventually outweigh those in the US.

Peerless did not have to wait long to discover if it had made the right call. The company has confirmed that the decision was correct. Michael A. Campagna, president and chief operating officer of Peerless, said that the company is now more competitive in terms of costs.

"The labor costs in China are rising, even more so now than when we left. We quoted some new projects this year to double-check costing in China and we discovered that they have gone up since we left," said Campagna.

According to a recent study conducted by Boston Consulting Group (BCG), rising wages, shipping costs and land prices in China - combined with a strengthening yuan and a weaker dollar - are narrowing the cost gap between China and the US for many goods produced for US consumers.

As a result, a trend of US companies ...'

http://yastrow.com/nlarchive/2011/cannibalize-yourself-12-20-11.html

'One of Jobs's business rules was to never be afraid of cannibalizing yourself. "If you don't cannibalize yourself, someone else will," he said. So even though an iPhone might cannibalize the sales of an iPod, or an iPad might cannibalize the sales of a laptop, that did not deter him...'