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The bank has also been briefing that Smith had been angling for a promotion and for the bank to double his pay to $1m, although Smith claims he would have quit even if his pitch had been successful. |
"What I can say to you, and this may sound stupid, is that I didn't go to Wall Street purely to make lots of money," he said. "I definitely wanted to make money, but I left because things had veered so far from what I actually believed was right. I could have just left and walked out and said nothing about it but I wou... |
Along with several other major Wall Street banks, Goldman has been widely criticised for making money at the expense of clients who did not fully understand the complex financial products they were dealing with. |
In 2010 Goldman was fined $550m as part of a settlement with the Securities and Exchange Commission – the largest in the US regulator's history – when the bank accepted that the marketing materials it issued to investors for its infamous Abacus transaction gave "incomplete information". |
The Abacus case had called into question the integrity of Wall Street after the commission alleged Goldman had packaged up mortgages into Abacus and then sold them to investors without telling them that one of its powerful clients, the hedge fund Paulson, had been taking a trading position intended to profit from a fal... |
Wisconsin congressman Paul Ryan has decided for a final time that he will not run for president in 2012, THE WEEKLY STANDARD has learned. Ryan, who began seriously considering a bid in late May after Indiana governor Mitch Daniels took himself out of the race, had consulted with top Republicans, including Karl Rove and... |
"I sincerely appreciate the support from those eager to chart a brighter future for the next generation. While humbled by the encouragement, I have not changed my mind, and therefore I am not seeking our party's nomination for President. I remain hopeful that our party will nominate a candidate committed to a pro-growt... |
Ryan's decision leaves New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie — or perhaps, Jeb Bush — as the last, best hope of the establishment Republicans who continue to pine for another option in the 2012 field. |
Workers at AFFCO's Wairoa plant are going back to court, saying they have been bullied since winning a major case against their employer. |
The Employment Court, in a decision released on 18 November, found workers on collective contracts had been unlawfully locked out after refusing to sign individual agreements. |
They were due to resume work this week. |
The Meat Workers Union said it was now seeking unprecedented judicial intervention from the Employment Relations Authority. |
It wanted a judge to set the terms and conditions of a collective agreement under a section of the Employment Relations Act that it said had never been used before. |
The union's national secretary Graham Cooke said there had been a serious breach of good faith, and workers at a number of plants were being left distressed. |
"I have never seen the likes of it and I have been involved in the meat industry since 1969. I have never seen such vicious retribution against the New Zealand Meat Workers Union, its members, whanau and communities." |
AFFCO general manager Rowan Ogg said the company totally rejected the statements made by the union, saying it was making baseless accusations. |
Mr Ogg said over 70 percent of workers were now on individual employment agreements, and this was growing daily. |
AFFCO is warning that it will not need to employ as many staff if Māori farmers withhold stock from the company. |
More than 75 percent of AFFCO's meat workers have signed individual contracts and only some staff want a collective contract reinstated, the company says. |
Cpl. Kevin Long, a team leader with Lima Company, 3rd Battalion, 1st Marine Regiment, sights his rifle down a road during one of the first patrols through Safaar since the clearing of improvised explosive devices in the Safaar area of Garmsir District, Helmand province, Islamic Republic of Afghanistan, Aug. 10, 2010. L... |
In March, CP Trucks of Toronto, Canada's largest for-hire carrier, joined the growing ranks of Canadian carriers establishing subsidiaries south of the border. It established a U.S. truckload division based in Milwaukee, Wis., called CP America, that will concentrate on full-load generated freight movements across the ... |
The decision to set up a U.S. subsidiary wasn't made solely for operational reasons; the truckload market is extremely competitive in the United States.CP Trucks' U.S. move is important in a strategic sense. It now can take full advantage of better tax breaks south of the border. |
As John Sanderson, vice-president of public affairs for CP Trucks, put it: There is a lower corporate tax rate plus faster equipment depreciation in the United States if you operate from a U.S. base across the border, you don't have to worry about the 4-cents-per-liter federal excise tax on diesel fuel. It becomes so o... |
Canadian truckers are chagrined that they're at a competitive disadvantage with U.S. truckers in paying taxes. This discrepancy - and a Price Waterhouse study commissioned by the Canadian Trucking Association in Ottawa indicates that the tax differential for truckers in Canada is 8 percent higher than in the United Sta... |
Because entry restrictions are lifting, it's now easier for U.S. carriers to run in Canada, especially in trans-border trucking. |
The Canadian trucking industry has urged federal Finance Minister Michael Wilson and his provincial counterparts to immediately address the tax situation. Truckers say that unless the tax bite is eased here more carriers will be forced to shift to the United States. |
The fact is that with our industry we do have deregulation and we do have a tax-sharing scheme between the United States and Canada that allows any trucking company to locate its tax base in either country without really moving their operations that much. No other industry has that opportunity, Mr. |
With President Reagan's tax reforms, the differences between the two regimes is pronounced. U.S. carriers can depreciate 93 percent of the original cost of their tractors in three years, compared with 58.4 percent for Canadian carriers for the same period. In fact, U.S. carriers can depreciate 100 percent of their truc... |
We have our Canadian trailer orders on hold, said Mr. Sanderson, who would rather buy Canadian equipment if all things were equal. But once you move to a U.S. tax base, you start to make your purchases in the United States, maintain your equipment in the United States and hire U.S. drivers. |
Canadian carriers based in the United States cannot bring their earnings back into the country without paying a withholding tax. |
So you start to invest the profits from the U.S. operations and pretty soon your whole structure is swaying toward the U.S., Mr. Sanderson said. |
Within six months, CP Trucks will restructure its five operating divisions so the companycan take full advantage of U.S. tax rates and equipment purchases. |
pressure on members of parliament to ensure that Ottawa acts soon on tax reform. |
John Kennedy, chief executive of the Ontario Trucking Association and vice-president of Business Development for the GTL Transport Group, of Alexandria, Ont., sees the tax situation as blatantly unfair. |
because of their better depreciation schedules, he said. |
The inequity in taxes is not only unnecessary, Mr. Kennedy said, in some cases it could be the straw that breaks the camel's back in terms of competition. |
He said the depreciation differences, compounded with Canada's excise tax on diesel ful, are creating havoc for Canadian carriers. |
GTL Transport has created a U.S. subsidiary to take advantage of the lower taxes. |
The federal Department of Finance has been studying in detail the Capital Cost Allowance provisions affecting truckers. |
But tax reform for truckers certainly does not appear to be on top of the government's priority list, said Mr. Kennedy, who was disappointed that there wasn't any change in the last federal budget tabled in February. |
The concessions Canadian truckers seek, however, can be introduced by the Finance Department any time. |
Mr. Kennedy warns that what is now a trickle of Canadian fleets moving south may well become a flood if Ottawa waits too long before enacting tax reform. |
Another sore point for Canadian carriers with Ottawa is the loss in the value of operating authorities. Deregulation has rendered the companies' costly licensing system irrelevant. |
We estimate the loss to be somewhere around C$50 million, Mr. Kennedy said. |
The industry, he said, would like to see Ottawa establish a C$25 million research unit to be known as the Canadian Transport Research Foundation. |
In this way, the government will give us something as an industry to help offset our loss, Mr. Kennedy said. |
Extremely well-kept craftsman style home with 4 bedrooms, 2 bathrooms and oversized 2 car garage. The home also received a new roof in 2014 and new furnace 201. Walking through you will notice high end finishes like hardwood and tile floors throughout, gas fireplace, beautiful granite counters and main floor laundry. |
Outside you can enjoy your beautiful sprinklered yard with maintenance free landscaping and poured concrete edging as well as a fully fenced yard. Seller offering a buyer $2,000 towards basement remodel at closing. |
Why do some scary movies shock us for decades, while others fade like a cheap scream in the night? |
In 1973, director William Friedkin's and writer-producer William Peter Blatty's runaway hit "The Exorcist" affected film audiences like few horror movies before or since. |
The times certainly helped contribute to this response. It was an era drenched with horror, both real life and on the screen: a time infected by the Vietnam War, Watergate, street violence, crime and movies that starkly reflected it all -- including those unprecedentedly savage, low-budget horror classics "The Texas Ch... |
But could we have predicted that "The Exorcist" would continue to exert its demonic spell 28 years later? |
Based on a huge bestseller by author Blatty -- who also wrote and produced the movie -- "The Exorcist" is the story of a glamorous household under siege in the Washington, D.C., neighborhood of Georgetown, while two lonely priests try to battle the forces of darkness. The heroine, single mother Chris MacNeil, is a smar... |
After the director of Chris' movie, Burke (Jack MacGowran), dies in a plunge from Regan's window, and Regan turns into a scar-faced, burning-eyed, profanity-spewing monster, it becomes clear to Chris that the doctors examining her daughter are clueless and helpless. Convinced that Regan is possessed by demons, she turn... |
Father Karras, struggling with a crisis of faith himself, is initially skeptical. But after learning about the case from Chris and avuncular police detective Lt. Kinderman (Lee J. Cobb) and after seeing Regan's head-whirling, crucifix-abusing, green vomit routines, he calls in an elderly, experienced exorcist, Father M... |
Back then, "The Exorcist" was effective, but obvious and shallow. I was a big fan of Friedkin's previous movie, the Oscar-winning cop thriller "The French Connection" and I liked Blatty's scripts for his frequent director, Blake Edwards ("A Shot in the Dark"). But I was suspicious of "The Exorcist" and its hype -- and ... |
In fact, writer Blatty had rejected Polanski. Friedkin was among his top choices, and he proved a brilliant match for the material. The Catholic-raised Blatty created a blueprint for a horrific shocker, but Friedkin, an agnostic from a Jewish family, made the story real -- and more terrifying. It is Friedkin's bleakly ... |
The movie is also blessed with the right cinematographer ("French Connection's" Owen Roizman) and a top-flight cast. I've always regretted that MacLaine, one of my favorite actresses, didn't play the part she inspired, but Burstyn makes the role her own. Miller and Von Sydow are a deeply affecting duo, two tormented bu... |
A major part of Regan's performance though, is thanks to another actress, who was anonymous at the film's first release. The voice of the devil possessing Regan -- with its macabre smoky rasp and vitriolic bursts of profanity -- belongs to Mercedes McCambridge, who won an Oscar as political aide Sadie Burke in 1949's "... |
Damned for its obscenity, fiercely attacked by many (including Billy Graham) for the ways it reflected that era's seeming collapse of values, "The Exorcist" has since then been attacked as a conservative allegory: the disguised story of a rich movie star rescuing her drug-addicted daughter with the help of the church. |
But "The Exorcist," like most memorable Hollywood movies, gains its power from the way it mixes opposites: new-style realism and sexual radicalism, old-style horror and religion. How odd it now seems that one of the most ferociously pro-Catholic films of its era should have been attacked as anti-Catholic, or that a fil... |
It has much more, though. Even after almost three decades of increasing movie overkill, it's a thriller that really thrills, a shocker that really shocks. And it's still a movie that can scare the hell out of us. |
Directed by William Friedkin; written and produced by William Peter Blatty, based on his novel; photographed by Owen Roizman; edited by Norman Gay, Jordan Leondopoulos, Evan Lottman, Bud Smith; production designed by Bill Malley; music by Jack Nitzsche, Mike Oldfield ("Tubular Bells"). A Warner Bros. release; opens Fri... |
Bangladesh has banned telecommunication companies from selling mobile phone connections to Rohingya refugees, citing security concerns for the latest restrictions, officials said Sunday. |
"For the time being, they (Rohingya) can't buy any SIM cards," Enayet Hossain, a senior officer at the telecoms ministry, told AFP on Sunday. |
The decision Saturday to impose a communication blackout on the stateless Muslim minority was justified for security reasons, said junior telecoms minister Tarana Halim. |
Bangladesh already prohibits the sale of SIM cards to its own citizens who cannot provide an official identity card, in a bid to frustrate the organisational capacity of homegrown militants. |
"We took the step (of welcoming the Rohingya) on humanitarian grounds but at the same time our own security should not be compromised," Halim said, without elaborating on what specific risk the Rohingya posed. |
Bangladesh's telecoms authority said the ban could be lifted once biometric identity cards are issued to the newly arrived refugees, a process the army says could take six months. |
It is just the latest restriction imposed on the Rohingya who have fled in huge numbers from violence in neighbouring Rakhine State into squalid camps in Bangladesh's southernmost Cox's Bazar district in the past four weeks. |
The nearly 430,000 refugees have been herded by the military into a handful of overstretched camps near the border, where tens of thousands live in the open without shelter. |
Many have been evicted from squatting in forest and farmlands by police and soldiers, who have been ordered to keep the Rohingya from seeking shelter in major cities and nearby towns. |
Roadblocks have been erected along major routes from the camp zones, where a dire shortage of food, water, shelter and toilets is creating what aid groups describe as a humanitarian crisis. |
Some 5,100 have already been stopped at these checkpoints and returned to the designated camps, police said. |
"We have set up 11 check posts across the Cox's Bazar highway to stop the Rohingya refugees from spreading further toward the interior," Cox's Bazar police chief Iqbal Hossain told reporters. |
Google has laid speculation to rest -- it is buying YouTube for US$1.65 billion in a stock transaction. |
YouTube operates a wildly popular Web site showing original videos in a range of quality from amateurish to professional. It will continue to operate independently after the Google acquisition "to preserve its successful brand and passionate community," Google said Monday when it announced the deal, which is expected t... |
Although YouTube Chief Executive Officer and co-founder Chad Hurley had previously insisted that YouTube wasn't for sale, that view changed because Google will allow YouTube to operate independently, he said during the conference call. |
Bringing YouTube into the ever-growing Google empire will mean that users have a "better, more comprehensive experience" when they upload, watch and share videos, Google said. It will also provide more opportunities for professional content owners to get their work out to a wider audience, Google and YouTube executives... |
The two have similar corporate values in that they are both committed to users first and also to innovation, Google CEO Eric Schmidt said. "Together, we are natural partners to offer a compelling media entertainment service," he said. |
The deal is "an exciting next step" for Google, he said, adding that the company expects other deals that are related to providing video over the Internet. YouTube has "built a remarkable team" that is "a perfect example of the kind of people we like to work with," he said in the conference call. YouTube's business is ... |
YouTube will benefit from Google's global reach and technology know-how, Hurley said. "We're excited by this announcement and thrilled to join forces with the Google team," he said. The acquisition will boost YouTube's new video content platform, which is expected to launch in the next month, he said. The deal is also ... |
Perhaps a more obvious fit is that the companies will merge Google's search expertise with YouTube's video expertise, pushing what executives believe is a hot emerging market of video being offered over the Internet. Google Video will continue to operate, executives said, calling that service "a very valuable aspect of... |
YouTube, founded in February of last year, has more than 70 million videos viewed daily on the site, according to the company. Besides allowing video viewing, the site has become a social networking phenomenon. Among other things, it has contests where viewers choose their favorite videos, including those submitted by ... |
Separately on Monday, both Google and YouTube announced deals with recording companies for displaying music videos online, in what is seen as a means to avoid copyright infringement lawsuits. Sony BMG Music Entertainment and Warner Music Group both signed deals with Google for their music videos to be on the Google Vid... |
The deal is a good move for Google, said analyst Aram Sinnreich, founder and managing partner with Radar Research, a Los Angeles technology and media research firm. |
"$1.65 billion is certainly a lot, but for a company like Google who will be using it as part of an integrated cross-media advertising strategy it may actually pay off," said Aram Sinnreich. "There aren't a whole lot of companies left to acquire with this kind of reach online," he added. |
Analysts also noted the similarities between the corporate cultures and how the companies developed and have grown. "Google has become a huge brand without advertising -- same with YouTube," said David Hallerman, a senior analyst at Emarketer in New York. |
Because YouTube has registered users, Google over time will know more about user behavior, which will enable the company to target advertising, he said. |
Although Google executives adamantly said otherwise, Hallerman doesn't think there is a future in the YouTube brand name. "YouTube is a silly name," he said. "Google will get rid of it over time." |
They say that the best media consumption device is the one that's within arm's reach, and that's especially true of women who consume lifestyle video. As part of the POPSUGAR Insights/ulive 2014 lifestyle video study, we asked women to identify the decision drivers that help them choose which of their devices they will... |
Convenience and accessibility are key factors that help women choose the device they will use to watch a lifestyle video. Women make their choices based upon which device is most accessible at the time (58%), which device allows them to watch wherever they want (52%), and which device allows them to multitask while wat... |
For younger millennial women between the ages of 18 and 24, the ability to be untethered and multitask is more important than for women overall. Sixty percent of women 18 to 24 said that the ability to watch whenever they want was a key decision driver, followed by accessibility (59%) and the ability to multitask (57%)... |
For avid lifestyle video consumers (women who stream 240+ minutes of lifestyle video per month), accessibility was less of a concern (52%) than it was for women overall. Additionally, women who stream the most lifestyle content were more likely to say that the ability to watch wherever they wanted (57%) was important t... |
In my article in the magazine this week, I made the case against empathy. Our capacity to put ourselves in the shoes of others—to feel their pain, to make their goals our own—might well be essential for intimate relationships. Nobody would deny that parents should feel empathy toward their children, or that romantic lo... |
This is particularly clear when we look at the criminal-justice system. People are understandably empathetic toward the victims of crime, particularly when they are young and vulnerable, when they are attractive, and when they share our race or ethnicity. It is far harder to empathize with those who are accused or conv... |
Psychologists have long observed the importance given to the face. The most striking demonstration I know of has to do with how competent one looks. The psychologist Alexander Todorov and his colleagues showed people black-and-white headshots of the winners and runner-ups in elections for various House and Senate races... |
Tsarnaev might not look particularly competent, but he is attractive—Althouse describes him as “a hot-looking young man.” Many studies have confirmed that individuals with attractive faces are judged to be happier, kinder, and more intelligent than their homelier counterparts; they are paid more, and are treated better... |
There is a long tradition of scholars who argue that the face reveals deeper truths. In “Essays on Physiognomy,” written in 1772, Johann Kaspar Lavater gave specific guidelines, such as ‘‘the nearer the eyebrows are to the eyes, the more earnest, deep, and firm the character.” In the late nineteenth century, the Italia... |
Relying on the face might be human nature—even babies prefer to look at attractive people. But, of course, judging someone based on the geometry of his features is, from a moral and legal standpoint, no better than judging him based on the color of his skin. Actually, both biases reflect the parochial and irrational na... |
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