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WSJ rankings show Salt Lake City, Atlanta and Minneapolis all Delta hubs as the best on time airports in the US. For reaching the most destinations Dallas, Texas and Dulles in Virginia. The best small airport is Indianapolis.

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R.E.O. is lingo for "Real Estate Owned," the term for homes taken in by banks that are from foreclosures. Reomac is the industry group that specializes in the sales of such homes. And "REO tsunami" refers to the flood of some 700,000 bank properties now on the market nationwide. Therre were just 100,000 in 2006. In February, nearly 45% of the home sales natinwide were called short sales in which homeowners under duress sell a property for less than their mortgage, according to the National Associaiton of Realtors. These sales have worsened a natiowide decline in home values, as REO homes typically sell at a 20% discount. Reomac just held its 2009 conference at Palm Desert. The extravagance and the excess at the conference is amazing considering that the whole country is facing this crisis and California is one of the hardest hit states. From the way people are trying to get these properties one could not imagine that the rest of the country is going through a crisis, and millions in developing countries might at this very moment be plunged below the poverty line!...

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Norwegian skier Lie McGrath with father US alpine skierand Norwegian mother on Vermont ski team, does something unusual in the Olympics. After leading 0.59 seconds and in a good position for first in downhill skiing in slalom he goes all out but makes one error missing a tightly set gate, then decides to throw his poles, teke off his skiis and go into the woods. He says-

"I thought I would get some peace and quiet, which I didn’t because photographers and police found me out in the woods. I just needed some time for myself.”

McGrath is a 5 time World Cup winner in slalom. He had lost his grandfather just at the start of the games and was distraught. He just decided this was it after the slight error. The Gold, Silver or Bronze medal meant little by that time.

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Income of $63,000 a year is what an average full time worker makes in the US and $140,000 what it takes to build a middle class life in the US in 2025. It is unlike the days of their parents say young people when most people could afford to buy a home if they worked full time. In 2025 engineers making $90,000 say they cannot make room for a down payment at that salary, or afford the cost of having one or two children. 

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Britain's trains on time record beats Germany's- it is at 98% during the coronavirus time. With about one tenth of the passengers as reopening happens gradually. The Deutsche Bahn German train system is suffering from a lack of investment, neglect of infrastructure. Britain's needs an update too, but the Deutsche Bahn has taken a sharp turn for the worse in recent years. The German government is shifting its attention away from protecting the auto industry to investing in infrastructure in its new $130 billion investment initiative to tackle the upheaval of digitisation, climate change, and decaying infrastructure. 

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U.S. gasoline prices at the pump drop below $3.00 in November 2014.

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For the first time deaths in Britain from coronavirus exceed 100,000. Deaths reached 103,602 on January 27, 2021, with all of the UK in lockdown again. Britain now has the highest coronavirus deaths per million population in the world. Analysis in The Times looks at what went wrong.

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This article in the Los Angeles Times "Shifting tides for Obama in 2012" puts things in perspective for the situation Biden faces in the 2024 campaign.  The LA Times points out in its report by David Lauter October 30, 2011, that among white working class voters the defeat Obama experienced in 2008 will turn into a rout in 2012. It says the rising racial diversity and increase in college graduates were only two factors helping Obama and this also was in doubt in 2012. The 2009 financial crisis had led to high unemployment and poverty among Hispanic households and also affected black people. The soured economy put Obama at risk in 2012. The rout among white working class voters for Obama in 2012 turned into a complete rout for Clinton in 2016. The Obama coalition looks like a one time affair and an aberration in America where white non college graduates almost all vote Republican. By putting white working class and factory voters firmly in the Democrats camp as they were for the last century and building a strong economy and manufacturing Biden now brings back the America of TR, Wilson, FDR, Truman and Eisenhower. By putting the struggle to improve the lives of working people at the heart of the democratic process Biden is rebuilding the America that transformed a less developed agricultural nation into a modern industrial economy. ...

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The steep decline in popularity of French president Emmanuel Macron in the period of one year. With the yellow vest protests on the economic insecurity of struggling families, Macron's efforts to bring in business friendly policies as a change agent are itself out of step with the times and with France in the provinces and small towns, as pointed out in the New York Times and Times of London analysis of the situation in France today.

As pointed out in the analysis Macron's base itself is small and its anti-institutional posture rejecting conventional politics itself has given momentum to the current yellow vest protests about economic insecurity of struggling families. The support for this comes from all parts of society and single political party, without nationalism, race or migration as factors at all, and comes so soon in one year from the time that Macron emerged with his own movement rejecting the institutional structure.  

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Times of London View in 2025- Labour would be wise to follow Merz of Germany's approach to illegal migrants and Farage's proposals need a hearing even if with a pinch of salt. Labour says The Times of London would be wise to take the get-tough approach of Germany's Merz.

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Don Bradman's 270 runs in the Ashes 1937 as the greatest batting of all time

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David Attenborough in Ocean (Disney+) and Wild London at 99 years age. In many BBC documentaries on Travel and Nature by the BBC broadcaster Attenborough, he shows the same enthusiasm and lively feeling. There is no drop in output, in quality and enthusiasm says this report in The Times of London.

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This report in The Times cites David Stockman, Reagan's budget director, saying afterwards that the Reagan tax cuts were a Trojan horse for getting tax cuts to the rich. The Reagan cuts says The Times did not work and led to huge deficits. Liz Truss's new budget with tax cuts is seen as a policy failure at a time of cost of living crisis for most people in the UK.

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Nutrition plays a big part in sleep. More fruits and vegetables, legumes, grains, fish in the diet helps sleep by supplying melatonin. Increases supply of the essential amino acid tryptophan. This includes dairy foods. Tryptophan is a precursor of serotonin which converts into melatonin. This needs to be eaten with high fibre diet as a legume or  grain so it is digested properly. Lower inflammation levels improve sleep quality and plant based foods lower inflammation. High fibre helps as a healthy gut is beneficial for sleep. 

Consistent eating times, separation between day and night so that the biggest calories are taken earlier in the day with a good breakfast in the bright daylight hours, and the night meal taken early a few hours before sleep. This sends signals that the body is winding down to sleep and get the body ready to sleep.

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This report in The Times shows the need to counter misinformation in parts of the media about vaccines. Inadvertently or through a poor comprehension of the data, German media reports in Handelsblatt and the Bild have stated that vaccine effectiveness for older people is 8%. Here in The Times of London, Oxford University and Astra Zeneca point out that the 8% figure is for the number of people in the trials who were given the vaccine in the age group 56-70 years. This does not refer to how effective the vaccines were in older people.  The first dose increases monoclonal antibodies for people of all ages, say Astra Zeneca and Oxford. We are now beyond trials in a sense today as Israel has vaccinated large parts of the population and the UK, India are vaccinating millions of British and Indian citizens. Israeli reports from one of the major medical centres show that the second dose increases monoclonal antibodies by multiple times and provides effective protection. As British data is available from medical research institutions from the vaccination drive in Britain, and from India, the effectiveness of the vaccines used in Britain and India will be shown more clearly. India today has used a package with near 100% compliance to tackle the virus relatively effectively by combining safety protocols (masks+ social distancing+ hygiene) with nutritional, medicinal protocols, restricted overseas flights. Cases are down to 13,000 for 1.2 billion people, with positivity rate in testing down to 1.66%. One readers comment in The Times says a lot- She says her 79 year old Irish mother was given the vaccine today in Coventry, England. She was given the Astra Zeneca Oxford vaccine jab by a British Asian doctor who took the time to talk to her, and listened to her and thanked her for her service as a midwife for 40 years. That these few minutes were the happiest time in 10 months for her mother. It also showed she says the very best of this country.   ...

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Debt markets and Analysts fear too much building of data centers will lead to construction taking more time for the AI data centers to come online, and by that time they fear aglut of data center capacity leading to losses. One AI data center company is asked to pay 3.75% more in interest rates, 70% more for loans. Other reports suggest caution because of the circular nature of data center investments where the same companies are coming up again and again in complex transactions and lack of transparency. Oracle took losses on it's stock price for its financial dealings.

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John Podesta's emails were hacked and then released through WikiLeaks to the media and public during the 2016 presidential election campaign. Stone commented at that time about the Wikileaks revealing damaging information about the Clinton campaign. Here Podesta gives his version of events in the Washington Post on the day of the arrest of Roger Stone in Florida by FBI agents acting in the Mueller investigation.

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Only the week before Tuesday April 7 Pakistan Foreign Minister Dhar failed to convince China to get involved. April 7th Tuesday in the US 1.30 pm US time, 8 pm Islamabad Pakistan time, China finally decided to jump in to convince Iran to accept peace talks in Islamabad. It is quite possible that behind the scenes the US was talking with China which has a 25 Year Comprehensive Agreement with Iran signed in 2021 that is the main support for the Iranian economy. China acted to reassure Iran that talks in Islamabad would proceed smoothly, and persuade Iran to accept ceasefire and talks. Why? Knowing that brinksmanship by US and Iran would lead to unforeseen consequences and hurt China's economy with oil price volatility as well as  hurt the US economy, and hurt the prospects for the planned May14-15 visit by DJT to Beijing to improve economic and political ties, both China and the US wanted to do everything to prevent this from happening. The result a hastily arranged peace talks in Islamabad so that by 4 am Islamabad time on Wednesday or 6.30 pm US time on Tuesday evening the ceasefire had already been agree to by US and Iran, according to this report in The Guardian from Pakistan. The crux of the matter was that it would affect US and China's economy with oil volatility, and US-China relations by jeopardizing May 14-15 revised date for DJT visit to Beijing. This good sense prevailed over all the war rhetoric and the media information and disinformation. It is confusing because of all the misinformation, but becomes clear when one understands this in the context provided in this report from Pakistan by the Guardian. Why Pakistan? For Pakistan the missile attack the day before of a Saudi petrochemical complex by Iran was drawing Saudis into the war and Pakistan has signed a defense agreement with Saudi Arabia that requires Pakistan to support Saudi Arabia if it gets into a war. For Pakistan it was a fragile situation that would be a catastrophe with unforeseen consequences on its economy. Already schools are closed for 1 month in Pakistan and oil is in short supply, paying for it at $115 or $125 a barrel would put severe strain on Pakistan. Who wins, who loses is being told in the media- much less on the good sense that prevailed  the efforts and the predicament of the large powers China, India, the US, and Germany, European Union, the poorer countries, all hurt economically, caught in a war they do not want, do not need. ...