Corning Inc

It's hard to complain too much about how Japan "stole" the high-tech electronics business from the U.S. More accurately, they took a low-margin business off our hands. And you know what we should be saying to that? Good riddance!

Thirty large American corporations -- all of them profitable -- spent more money on lobbying than they paid in federal taxes from 2008 to 2010, according to a report from the nonpartisan reform group Public Campaign.

Corning's (GLW) third-quarter profit rose 22% from a year earlier, as higher sales of the company's automotive and diesel-emission products more than offset the falling glass prices for flat-panel TVs.

It's being called a breakthrough in electronics production, but Corning's made-in-the-U.S.A. Gorilla glass is actually decades old. And now it's poised to go from the face of smartphones to borderless flat-screen TVs.