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A detailed WSJ report by a number of reporters and journalists who were in the field during the hours and days when the fighting started. It shows that both sides had been preparing for a number of years for the fighting, the Russians in Abhkazia and South Ossetia and the Georgians, and the Russians and the Americans had supplied Georgia with new weapons so the US also was aware of the buildup. Its just that when the fighting started with shelling by both sides, and when Sashkavili made the decision to go into the S. Ossetian capital Tshkinvali he did not expect the Russians to respond so strongly, and Putin personally to respond the way he did. He totally misjudged Putin and the Russians. But the military preparations on both sides show that all sides were preparing for conflict and should the US have paid more attention to the region so that it was caught unawares.

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Arthur Levitt former SEC Commissioner on proposed regulatory changes. He calls for the merger of the SEC with the Commmodities and Futures Trading Commission so that there is one unified regulator. It is the CFTC that has the responsibility to regulate derivative trades that have done lot of the damage in this crisis. The new agency would supervise markets for OTC, exchanges, boards of trade, municipal debt; broker dealers, investment banks, accounting standards,rating agencies,mutual funds, hedge funds,corporate reporting, and the clearance and settlement systems. He rejects Secretary Paulson's idea of gutting the SEC and the CFTC of their mandates and placing the Fed and Treasury in charge of our markets, a proposed approach made in 2007. To this Levitt says just imagine our financial markets controlled by the White House. He wants this new regulator agency have a chairman appointed for 7 years and commissioners appointed on a non partisan basis.

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Borchers of the Washington Post reflects on why president Trump gave the long rambling interview in July 2017 to the NYT.  President Trump has  called the NYT both "failing" and "a crown jewel." He particularly respects the reporter Maggie Haberman, a reporter with whom Trump has a long relationship and whose reporting he respects. Haberman is seen by Trump as an influential political reporter, whose view counts, and who can be critical but also seeks to be fair in reporting. During the election campaign the NYT carried reporting critical of Trump, yet it also had reporters who were critical of Hillary Clinton. In many ways both the NYT and the WSJ from different points of view seek a place in the middle with fair reporting, needed particularly in today's politics where ideology sometimes trumps common sense and U.S. traditions of fairness.

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Emil Bowe, 43 years, is a federal prosecuting attorney at Southern Division, New York. WSJ calls him a state school kid among Ivy Leaguers, a law and order type who is passionate about prosecuting the bad guys. Emily Bowe and Todd Blanche are Deputy Attorney General and Principal Attorney General under DJT in 2025. Todd Blanche brought him in to defend DJT in 2024 cases filed against DJT.

Bowe from Seneca Falls upstate New York  went to University of Albany for BA and Georgetown for JD. He has given priority to pursuing immigration offense and narcotics crime in preference to white collar crimes and has a single minded dedication to the task. He is now overhauling the Justice Department to make the shift from white collar crime to immigration and fentanyl flows at the US borders.

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Chase Banks' Jamie Dimon says he worries about China as a competitor and an adversary, but his real worry is that we in the United States can "get our act together."

“If we are not the pre-eminent military and the pre-eminent economy in 40 years, we will not be the reserve currency. People tell me we are enormously resilient. I agree with that. I think this time is different. This time we have to get our act together and do it very quickly.” 

“What I really worry about is us,” he said. “Can we get our own act together—our own values, our own capabilities, our own management?”

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For the first time Ukrainian faces doing great work in wartime, staying calm in unbelievable stress, as part of Ukraine Rail, can now be seen. The amazing work done by Ukrainian Railways for helping get refugees to Poland from cities like Kharkiv and Kviv hard hit by shelling, is shown in this Guardian picture essay. On the return trip the trains bring back humanitarian aid from Poland sent by the US and European Union countries. The Ukrainian Railways has 230,000 workers and all of them have remained in the country to operate the trains and train stations in this war and refugee crisis. Many of the trains operate in darkness into stations that are dimly lit. "The soul is torn and the heart aches, as a train driver I see what is going on," says Chumak, 43, the train driver for the Kviv to Lviv trains for evacuation of women, children and other refugees. At the peak 200,000 people were travelling every day going west to Lviv, trains were free of charge for everyone with women and children having priority. In the first 2 weeks of the war 2 million passengers were taken to safety. Shown here also is the train driver Yaroshenko, 36, for Train No. 82  the Uzhorod to Kviv train going to the Slovakian border. During the journey the train lights are turned off near Kviv or anywhere that is dangerous, as he says who knows who might be lurking nearby. He sees himself as part of the Ukrainian war effort. Tetjana, 36, and her daughter Sofia, 5, are shown on a train to Przemysyl in Poland. She worked as a train conductor on evacuation trains till she decided to take the refugee train herself for the sake of her daughter. If tracks are damaged, they are quickly repaired. Territorial defense units protect the key places and bridges so that the risk is reduced, though shrapnel from missile attacks elsewhere can damage windows of trains.   ...

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Germany faces the possibility of a pandemic surge of the unvaccinated, something that is happening today in the southern United States.  For days the percentage of people that are fully vaccinated remains at 62%. Some vaccination centers are closed. A vaccination center outside the train station in Cologne offers passersby free vaccinations. Berlin's Social Democrat mayor Michael Muller is very frustrated. He says "I am now coming to a point where I think we have exhausted what we can do in politics."  At 62% the rate of fully vaccinated people in Germany is too low to prevent a surge of the Delta variant in the way that it has hit the southern US, and California. Vaccination rates of close to 85% are needed to tackle the risk of another surge in highly contagious delta variant. Not everyone remaining is die hard opposed to vaccines. The Robert Koch Institute estimate is that 5 to 10% of people are in that die hard category. The remaining 20-30 % are people who have various other concerns and fears, hesitancy, that may be changed.  The chairman of the World Medical Association Frank Ulrich Montgomery favors a vaccine mandate, what he calls a 2G rule, that should be introduced in Germany requiring vaccination to attend events, sports, restaurant visits, adopted nationwide. German government has rejected idea of mandatory vaccination of health personnel, that was adopted in France. Vaccination drives are regionally based. Some are ineffective such as the Deutsche Bahn train system vaccination drive for commuters that only had a few hundred doses of J&J vaccine and ran out quickly in Berlin. One prick J&J some say is better for vaccine skeptics. Vaccine skeptics think they may get away without getting covid infection. How does one get over this misconception? Others including members of the Greens party say vaccine needs to be delivered where people are- transit points, bus stops, doses offered in evening and early morning hours, trying new ways to reach people and inspire confidence. Germany now ranks behind France but ahead of Bulgaria in terms of vaccination percentage in September 2021, not a good situation. ...

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Bret Stephens of NYT shows a lack of knowledge of European history and remains oblivious of the disastrous consequences of Reagan's policies that he lauds. He cites Reagan as saying to his own audience - "My idea of policy towards the Soviet Union is simple, some would say simplistic. It is "We win, you lose."  The US did not win through Reagan policies, it began three decades of US involvement in wars in Iraq, Afghanistan, the Middle East, with Iran, that have wasted trillions of dollars and many lives, a period in which it created space for the emergence of China as a world power with newer infrastructure built in a period in which China could quietly rebuild and modernize while the US frittered away its vital resources to the point that funding was missing for vital infrastructure rebuilding and education was not financed by the government as it had done in the early postwar years. The classic European History book by Cambridge historian Brendan Simms, "Europe- The Struggle for Supremacy 1453 to the Present" shows that every time any country became too powerful, the others regardless of religion, old ties or other affiliation joined together to counterbalance and restore the balance- Britain, France, Russia, Austria-Hungary were never allowed to become too dominant. The idea that the Soviet Union collapsed because of Reagan's policies is incorrect- it would have collapsed a decade later without Reagan as by the 1980's the people running the government and the ordinary people had realized the system was not meeting the aspirations of Russians. By buying into this myth Americans were embroiled in useless wars and in so doing probably destroyed more wealth in a short time than any period in world history- the trillions of dollars of oil wealth transferred not to countries such as China or India that had to pull themselves by the bootstraps but to Arab desert regions that were itself not benefitted because they went to fight wars and destruction. ...

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The significance of Notre dame Cathedral for France and Europe over 1000 years is shown in this timeline in Le Monde.  The year 1163-  An ancient cathderal St Etienne Cathedral is in decline. In its place will be built Notre Dame. Maurice de Sully becomes Bishop of Paris in the reign of Louis VII in the 12th century. Sully decides to build a great cathedral in honor of the Virgin Mary. The first stone is laid inthe presence of Pope Alexander III. The year 1239- Louis the IX is the first canonized King of France, Saint Louis participated in the seventh and eighth crusade and purchased the relics of the Passion from the Latin Emperor of Constantinople. These relics are seen to be the most honored in Christendom and are installed in the Notre Dame Cathedral.The most significant is the crown of thorns which he carries into the cathedral barefoot in 1239. He build Sainte Chappelle 500 metres away in the Isle de Cite. The year 1594- The Wars of Religion tear France apart. Henry IV is caught in the midst of the Wars of Religion between Catholics and Protestants from 1562 to the Edict of Nantes in 1598 . It is at Notre Dame that the King Henry iV asserts his power against the Catholic League by attending a Te Deum. Notre Dame is again used as a symbol of recapture in 1918 and on Aug 26, 1944 with the Magnificat for Liberation. 1708- With Louis XIII comes the dedication in 1638, the Vow of King Louis XIII putting his kingdom under the protection of the Virgin Mary, and August 15 as celebration day. 1844- Viollet le Duc emerges as the builder of the renovation of the now aging structure of Notre Dame. Two million frances for restoration run out in 1851. The project resumes in 1859. 1991- It is the project of tourism and heritage as the national site of France. 2019- the second renovation of Notre Dame in Paris begins after the fire.   ...

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Activity in downtown San Francisco remains at about a third of prepandemic levels, with remote work having caught on for tech companies during the pandemic employees are there for only half of the week. Office vacancy rates are 28% for downtown. In a strange twist Silicon Valley that led the shift of manufacturing to China and ignored that this led to loss of tax revenues for the towns across America, and decline of these towns that lost factories, is now facing the same situation in its own backyard. Office based industry provides three quarters of San Francisco tax revenue, and faces a $780 million deficit for the next 2 years. Mentally ill on streets near a Whole Foods, and dealers in Fentanyl, homelessness, lead to closing of a Whole Foods store in downtown San Francisco. Thomas Fuller and Sharon LaFraniere provide this report in WSJ of the situation in downtown San Francisco in 2023. Reports from California show the failure to build enough housing during the tech boom for the average American, and apartments for homeless costing hundreds of thousands of dollars and years behind schedule. The mayor is looking for tougher laws to put mentally ill off the streets. There is no consensus on action. Tech investors people hope for another Tech boom to tackle the situation, yet tech companies are retrenching and face government scrutiny even breakup. Even a speeded up effort to add 20% of the housing stock of the city of San Francisco by adding 83,000 apartments from Mayor Ms. Breed would take 8 years.  ...

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It is a sign of hope in Europe that the period known as the "Troubles" is over. Emma Little-Pengelly of the Democratic Unionist Party in Northern Ireland has dropped the boycott of the Assembly. She is assuming the post of second minister.  Little Pengelly says that we are shaped by the past but we are not defined by it. The party with most seats in the Assembly gained by looking out for people of both communities for housing and other basic needs is Sinn Fein's Michelle O'Neill. This is a new form of what PM Modi has called "Nari Shakti" or women's outlook and strength in Britain bringing peace and development to the island of Ireland. The Indian parliament was recently opened by a woman president Ms. Murmu and the Budget presented the next day by Ms. Sitharaman. Michelle O'Neill says we are not asking to move on, we are asking only to move forward. Such are the changes happening on opposite ends of the former British Empire as Modi moves forward with "sab ka vikas sab ke sath," development for all by all, and in Ireland with release of $4 billion by the Sunak UK government northern Ireland can move forward with meeting people's needs. Both Catholic and Protestant communities are asked to work with each other under the Good Friday Agreement and power is shared for helping people of both communities get better housing, education and other needs for themselves and their children. ...

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Tim Pawlenty, former Republican governor of Minnesota, and co-chair of the Romney campaign, becomes the head of the lobbying organization for U.S. banks, Financial Services Roundtable. He succeeds Steve Bartlett. During his brief presidential run in 2012, Pawlenty raised $5 million in donations from banks. Sorkin talks to Bartlett about the appointment and Pawlenty's criticism of banks during the bailout. Bartlett says that in Washington what you say and think depends on the position you are in.

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This editorial in the Economist points out the dangers for Britian of having a non functioning opposition in parliament to act as a check on government policies. It says Jeremy Corbyn has damaged the Labor Party by being intolerant of other views. It points out that Corbyn is popular with young people in the half million members of the party, yet nationally among Britain's 45 million voters he has an approval rating of -18%. It hurts the Brexit negotiations putting the hard line Brexit supporters who see it in terms of a single issue immigration, in control. It hurts Britain's union, with Scotland in serious difference about Brexit. Corbyn is unpopular in Scotland where Labor needed a comeback. The Economist sees Corbyn as a disaster similar to the view expressed for Europe in a recent DW.com article.

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How the Bush presidency started with hopes in domestic policy that were never to come to fruition. Jacob Weisberg, editor of Slate, reflects on the promise of the Bush State of the Union address of Feb. 2001, and the compassionate conservatism it evoked- the Bush priorities of education, setting higher educaion standards, immigration reform, helping needy and at risk children, health care access. He recalls the words used by Bush in Spanish: "Juntos podemos," we can do it together. As governor of Texas Bush had focussed on racial disparities and gaps in education, winning 27% of black votes and a third of Hispanic votes. Then came 9/11 (2002), weapons of mass destruction (from 2003 onwards), which soon overshadowed the education efforts, grants to extend health insurance coverage, initiative to encourage mentring of at-risk children. The $10 billion program to fight AIDS in Africa and the Caribbean is a part of the Bush legacy, other areas were overcome by the distraction of wars in the Middle East....

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Michael Fathers reviews two detailed accounts of Mao's Great Leap Forward. From 1958-62 Mao launched an effort to industrialize China in its effort to surpass Krushchev's effort to surpass the U.S. and western nations in one decade. Yang Jingsheng's account in the book 'Tombstone,' is a result of decades of research to find what happened during this period. He lost his own father to starvation during this period when all Chinese agriculture was forced into communes with communal living and communal kitchens. The result were disastrous as agricultural production suffered badly leading to famines and loss of an estimated 45 million lives. The policy was continued even as the result showed a looming disaster by 1959. It was only by 1962 that Mao was forced to accept the failure of the program. As an editor of Xinhua news agency, Jingsheng had access to accounts of waht happened in provincial documents and archives. The other book reviewed is 'The Great Famine' by Frank Dikotter which provides an illuminating account of what happened in these years. Dikotter says the final responsibility rested with Mao for calling for higher grain deliveries from the countryside at the height of the famine and for continuing the policy of force and coercion leading to starvation- he quotes Mao who said: "It is better to let half the people die so that the other half can eat their fill." The truth about this period was hidden by propaganda and the mistake accounts of westerners who visited China including Francois Mitterand till the 1990's. Jasper Becker, a former correspondent in China for the Guardian, gave one of the first accounts of what had happened in "Hungry Ghosts: China's Secret Famine" (1996). What shocked readers was the extent of the dead, the violence, and the fear of speaking out even after 30 years. The fear of speaking out is evidenced in the pen name Mo Yan of the Nobel prize winner in Literature for 2012 which means do not speak out in Chinese because his parents were from a more affluent farming family in the village. Mo Yan uses animal and fairy tale characters and Chinese history in his novels and stories including his effort to describe the behaviour of arrogant local officials. The chronology of this period also tells a story. China's Communists took control in 1949, the famine and violent repression to establish the commune system occured in 1958-1962 only 8 years later, and the Great Proleterian Cultural Revolution was launched by Mao in 1966 and was to last a decade till his death in 1979- a period which saw a new effort of upending of China's countryside to establish communism....

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Dan Balz describes the resilience of Donald Trump's candidacy, and the contest between Cruz and Trump, both tapping into anger at the grassroots. He points to the little headway made by the other candidates, Rubio, Kasich, Bush and Carson. Trump's high moment was when he described the way New Yorkers handled the 9/11 collapse of the World Trade Center and other buildings. Cruz passionately handled questions on the birth issue- being born of an American mother in Canada- and the loan from Goldman Sachs, coming out stronger than before.

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U.S. president Obama offers his own assessment of the divisive rhetoric of Trump and its origins in the way the Republican Party has opposed him throughout his two terms, including opposition to Obamacare, and ways to tackle poverty, joblessness, without offering alternatives. He says conservative news outlets encouraged this trend till Mr. Trump said he could do this better by raising the level of rhetoric. Democratic candidates Hillary Clinton, Bernie Sanders and voices in the Republican Party are critical of the way Trump conducts his rallies, and the abusive rhetoric for Latinos, Muslims and minorities.

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U.S. president Obama's nominee for U.S. Supreme Court Justice to fill the seat open after the death of Justice Scalia is Merrick Garland. Garland is described here by the NYT as a centrist looking more for the right answer than pursuing any ideological agenda. He is from Harvard Law School and finished a clerkship under Supreme Court Justice Brennan. He is seen as a listener interested in getting a better understanding of what people are saying, and thinking things through. Garland is chief judge of the federal appeals court in Washington D.C.

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Petrobras CEO, Aldemir Bendine, faces the difficult tasks of regaining investor confidence, establishing better governance, and carrying out a divestment program to cut the debt load of $133.9 billion. He is a bank executive from Banco do Brasil appointed in February 2015 following the corruption scandal at Petrobras. The new board at Petrobras following the corruption scandal is now free of political appointees, and includes academics, business leaders and technical experts. Bendine says, today there is not the same atmosphere as in the past with political appointees, and he sees no chance for government interference.

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Amar Bhide says it is time for banks to go back to their basic functions of taking deposits and making traditional loans, and to restrict risk taking activites, so that the U.S. can return to stable sustainable growth without recurring financial crises. He suggests a simple rule- activities that the average examiner cannot understand should not be allowed, which would restrict many of the activities of banks that lack transparency and pose systemic risks. He says the Dodd-Frank reforms have not tackled the dangers of risk-taking by banks and new leadership is required.

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The Indian pharmaceutical industry is expected to grow by 13% to $24 billion in 2010. R&D is a special focus, as new drugs can be developed at much lower cost in India. Mr. Piramal, for instance, kept the R&D operation of Piramal when he sold the rest of the company to Abbott Labs of the USA. The Piramal lab in Mumbai has 300 researchers and scientists, and Mr Piramal says he can develop new drugs at a tenth of the $1.5- $2 billon cost it takes for this in the USA and Europe.

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Prof. Admati, of Stanford, says that with the March 2012 stress tests the Fed has prematurely announced the banks are healthy. Prof. Cole of DePaul University, questions some of the assumptions used by the Fed as too optimistic even though it used a 13% unemployment rate and decline in stock and real estate values by 21%. He says the loss of $56 billon on home equity lines of credit and second lien mortgages, 13% of the portfolio, is highly underestimated. He says the legal liabilities of banks are also underestimated.

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Jonathan Gruber, the MIT professor, who has done extensive modeling of U.S. health care systems. Gruber advised Massachusetts Governor Romney in crafting the health care law in that state. He also advised the Obama administration in crafting the health care mandate that requires all Americans to buy health insurance to keep costs down. Gruber estimates the number of newly insured Americans could drop to 8 million from an estimated 32 million if the Supreme Court strikes down the health care law mandate. The result he believes will drive insurance premium prices even higher.

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Bank of Korea's senior deputy governor, Lee Ju-yeol, says he feels "heavy resposibility" for the policies pursued by S. Korea's central bank in the years following the financial crisis of 2008, when inflation fighting efforts of the bank were set aside to focus on growth. Inflation has increased in S. Korea in recent years. He said our "hard won reputation was turned away under the current of globalization and reform... values and rules that have been built up over 60 years were denied in just a single day."

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Lt. Gen John Allen will succeed Gen Petraeus in leading the war effort in Afghanistan. Allen was the deputy commander in Anbar province, Iraq, from 2006-2008. He backed Colonel Sean MacFarland's efforts to get Sunni tribal leaders to join the U.S. against Al Quaeda militants- which came to be called the Sunni Awakening. Allen is close to Gen. Petraeus and has the skills and diplomacy that Petraeus is known for. He is described as someone who understands that the war in Afghanistan involves policy, politics, perceptions and diplomacy.