Imus in the morning is apple still the king of cool . Good morning, everyone, well, did you watch the big concert last night . Have you watched much football recently . Where were the apple ads . The Samsung Galaxy phone he was everywhe everywhere, so was the microsoft tablet. Nearly 200 below the high, the question stands, is apple still king . Good question. Google is it on the attack and telling apple to get lost, almost literally. And theres a new app which puts google maps back on the ipad, goodbye apple happens. Hipocracy keeps coming after you. Warren Buffetts Berkshire hathaways buying back stock why . To void taxes increases, warren was rooting for, and an estate tax he himself will not pay. Are you getting tired of this . Varney company is about to begin. From the best players in history to the number 1 club in the world. The potential of Manchester United unlocked. Nyse euronext. Unlocking the worlds potential. Youve got to say hes still the greatest, isnt he . Eric clapton performing at the 121212 concert to benefit the victims of hurricane sandy. The event went on five hours and a ton of money. 36 million alone in ticket sales and does not count the donations or the money they got from sponsored like samsung which surely paid a big price to have the galaxy phones featured everywhere and the celebrities answering the calls from people who phoned in donations, galaxy phones they were using. Youre seeing galaxy ads everywhere, they dominate Football Games on sundays as well. Apple, the ipad, ipad mini, the iphone their ads have been swamped by samsung and microsoft. Is apple still the king of cool . Shareholders wants to know and so do i. Lets bring in mark, editor in chief of laptop magazine. Is apple still the king of cool . What do you say. When it comes to the design and getting the latest apps first, would i say yes for apple, but perception is becoming reality when it comes to the marketing ads youre talking about. When people see the big screen galaxy note 2 and in the office when i show people turn it on its side and two applications running on the screen the same time and pen input. In a lot of areas theyre outinnovating apple and outmarketing apple, apples bread and butter for a long time. Stuart mark, well get you more on the Microsoft Surface tablet. Hold on a second ive got this for you. You want cool . Take a look at this house, a mansion this miami on the market more than six months and get this, it was bought by a foreign investor theyre everywhere and sold for under asking price, guess how much . Well be telling you that, how much it cost and other properties, too, at the top of the hour coming up. Here is what we have next. The new microsoft tablet. We have one right here on the set with us. What makes it so cool . Should apple be worried . [ male announcer ] this is steve. He loves risk. 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And now youre protected. Here we go. Thursday morning in the news background today. Retail sales up, but only just. In the latest month. Producer prices down and of course, we had yesterday the announcement from ben bernanke, hes going to be spending, printing 85 billion dollars a month to keep Interest Rates low and try to get the Unemployment Rate to 6 1 2 . Hes been doing it for four years and i dont know how the markets going to react to that. In the very early going this morning, were down five points. The opening trend is ever so slightly down after the announcement of a big printing oranges. Right off the bat, i want to look at warren Buffetts Berkshire hathaway. Buffett brought back 1. 2 billion dollars worth of shares from one investor yesterday and that likely helped that investor, helped his estate save substantially on taxes ahead of higher tax rates, which are almost certain for next year, remember, buffett also called on congress to raise the estate tax on the wealthy and he wants the rich to may more in taxes and im going to use the word hipocracy rightly on wrongly and encouraging everybody else to pay more, but he and his company doesnt pay that tax, very interesting. A new report that the founder of best buy, Richard Schultz is going to make an offer to buy the company back, take it private again. Possibly the offer comes tomorrow. Nicole, ive got to believe that best buy is up. Stuart you believe correctly, up about 15 . Refer time we hear that Richard Schultz is moving forward with taking his baby private, it goes up and every time its not, it tanks. The sales have been dwinldling and is he and a group trying to take it private. Stuart im waiting for solar city, the Solar Panel Company and i think the ipo is today when it starts trading well get back to you then. Thanks a lot. Ill show you about the price of gas because it continues to drop. The National Average for a gallon of regular down another penny, were at 3. 31 now, diesel 3. 97. Ive got to tell you, its still the highest price for gas ever at this time of year. New york still the highest in the continental u. S. , 3. 78 in new york, thats the average and missouri the lowest, 3. 01 a share and missouri is the only city, only place, rather, where we found major cities with the average price under 3. Again, the star is st. Louis, at 298. Lets get back to apple, losing its cool, maybe. And mark is still with us, the editor in chief of laptop magazine. All right. I want to talk about lets see, this is the Microsoft Surface tablet, all right. Yes. Stuart now, is this a threat to apples dominance of the tablet market and apples dominance of cool . Do you like this thing . In the shortterm i dont think its a threat, but there are some things that surface has especially for workers that the ipad doesnt, one of the things off the bat youll notice this has a smart cover, sort of like the ipad, but this one has a deboard built in and you see on the back, this little kick stand in the design, lets you prop it it up. Lets you use it as a mini laptop. Stuart do you guys in hightech like this thing, acceptable, a real player in the tablet market from microsoft. Yes. Its a qualified yes because it has potential, when you think about it this is microsofts first fablet and usually takes a couple of runs for them to get something right, but like the live tell interface, which is dynamic, its a lot more personal than the ios, a lot of your stuff springs to life, that sort of thing. Stuart its an active screen, isnt it the tiles or whatever you call them. The live tiles, keeps you uptodate and so, for example, could i my wife what she posted on twitter or facebook. Stuart automatically, dont have to go to it pops up sitting there waiting for you. Exactly. Stuart hold on a second, youve got a phone, the microsoft phone, isnt it. Right. Stuart now, is that a threat to the iphone . You better turn that thing off im getting all kinds of rf. And is that a threat to the iphone and the coolness of the iphone . I think were still getting the buzz. Are we . 3 c1 you have to turn it off. Im sorry. There you go, okay, so, i do think between these two devices, Windows Phone is bigger threat not only to the iphone, but to android because theres more partner involved and doing more with the software. One feature we like in Windows Phone 8 is a feature kids corner. When you hand your phone to the kids, press power button swipe to the right and only apps you approved for nem on the screen. And another feature, rooms, all members of the family can share messages and photos. Whats interesting to me is that microsoft didnt make these features available on windows 8 itself. And when i asked that question they said were working on it, release schedules were not together, but Little Things like that tells me that microsofts Division Needs to be working more closely together. Nos dialogs must be broken down. Stuart full disclosure, i own stock in microsoft. Everybody knows it im not grinding an ax, youre telling me that that Windows Phone and tablet are pretty good entry for microsoft into the phone and tablet marketplace. I think the phone is a better start, its been around longer, tablet side a lot of of people are confused by the interface. Stuart do you think that phone is a threat to android devices. It will eat into its share other time. Theres more partners getting involved and leverage brand like xbox. And one rumor that microsoft is coming out with a xbox focused gaming tablet, much less productivity, more focused on gaming and entertainment. Something for 2013. Stuart all right. Mark, thank you for being here, good stuff. A good example why you dont see a lot of the daytoday back and forth from fiscal cliff talks reported here on Varney Company because it really is maddening. It turns people off. We know that. Listen to how harry reid responded to, what im going to say is a perfectly legitimate request he whether they will bring the president s fiscal cliff proposal to a vote. Just listen to this. The white house proposal that they floated around on capitol hill will i, i dont know. I have no idea what youre talking about. The white houses plan, the treasury secretary you know what the plan is it . The plan that included ref nigh awn what kind of revenue. The top 2 . What else . And the debt limit and what else. And theres plenty. 1. 6 trillion and the stimulus, 2 it00, 200 billion. I think it was and. Well, joining us now is the man who had that exchange with senator reed from the daily caller. Nick, what did you and or our viewers and myself. What are we supposed to get out of that interview with senator ray reid. I went in to the press conference not knowing id get a quiz about the details. It was a clear question to the majority leader will you bring the president s plan up for a vote and he clearly did not want to answer it and an attempt to distract from the question asking me what are the details of this plan. And i think it points to an issue we have in in fiscal cliff debate, where you know, no one really knows the heart of this debate and the real issues that are at stake here. Well, and then senator reid put you down in a way and the other members of the media around you. I thought they were, they were basically laughing, they were laughing attyou. Now, what does that tell you and our viewers about the establishment media and their reaction to your interchange with senator reid . If i were in the audience when that was going on, i would have had followed up and ive done it before. I asked followup questions about issues that you know people are bringing up in presence conferences when the person on the podium is not answering the question. It makes sense to keep asking questions to get the answers and nobody, nobody did. Stuart thats very true. Nobody did it and you know, its just maddening for us viewers to look at this debate and its not a debate at all. Were on the outside, cant find out whats going on. Nick, we appreciate you being with us, im sorry to cut it short. All kinds of stuff going on today. But nick, thanks for being with us, appreciate it. Thank you. Here is what we have new at ten. The president wants to keep on spending, but thats not what the voters want. New numbers on the deficit and poll numbers showing a strong move towards cutting spending. That will come up at the top of the hour, this program today. Also, in our next hour. Why is john stossel offending commissions two weeks before christmas . Here what he said at 10 45. Apple iphone users rejoicing after news that google is bringing back the map application. Where is the stock of apple google were watching both, google is higher. Whats the story, stuart . What do you think . Is it that apple iphone users are finally happy because theyve been so annoyed with the new map service at apple, it stinks and happy to get it. Stuart and i think that is it that theyre crawling back to google. Stuart no, no, i think the story is google is socking it to apple and say, hey, weve got an app and put it on the ipad and ipad mini through apple. Go away apple maps, its poi pointless. The google guys must be running around the offices with confetti and horns and saying, yes you couldnt do it without us. Stuart thats exactly right. And thats what theyre doing over there at google. Stuart thats right, so google is up and apple i think is barely holding its own, i think its down at the moment. It is down 1 . Stuart weve been questioning whether apple is still cool and well keep questioning. Nicole, thank you very much indeed. Again this thursday morning, ive got to tell you its a dead flat market. Look at that, down 1 points. The day after ben announces a new printing operation. Thats dead flat. All right, thursday morning, 7 early movers for you, maker of George Foreman grills and rayo vac batteries, say that some shareholders are selling and that stock is down big pill. Pep boys the board authorized 50 Million Dollars stock repurchase program. Up a little bit. Boston brew, that is the boston is it boston beer . Yes, boston beer, brewer of sam add dollar amounts and raised the profit forecast and stock is up big time. Look at that, 16 higher. Endo Health Solutions expects profits this year and next year, theyre going to disappoint, down, but not much. Increased sales helped Restoration Hardware to a profit. Its down a little. And retailer pier 1 increases the dividend up just a little. Wider loss at the Telecom Equipment maker sienna. And its down, so what, up. The Health Advocates are winning the battle of the bulge. Whats causing the obesity rates to go down . Listen to some Christmas Music and read a statement. Bring us some figgy pudding im not sure that figgy is at government cannot make man richer, but it can make man poorer. We wont sing until we get some we wont sing until we get some so bring it out here oh, hey. [ male announcer ] at scottrade, we believe the more you know, the better you trade. 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Obesity in children in new York City Schools between 20072011 have dropped. How do we define obesity. For children roughly in the 95th percentile or above compared to the other children. Stuart that definition has not shifted. Youre not cooking the numbers. Not during that time frame at all. So if youre in the top five percentile of weight versus height, you are obese and the number in that percentile is