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Rising tensions between the U.S. and Iran after stiff U.S. sanctions on Iranian oil from president Trump impacts the safety of oil tankers in the Straits of Hormuz. The explosions were on Japanese oil tankers as the prime minister of Japan Shinzo Abe met with Iran's leaders in Tehran and offered to help reduce tensions between the Trump administration and Tehran.

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The biography of Lula da Silva on the Brazil government site gov.br 2025. It shows Lula as one of 8 children from deep in rural Pernambuco state in northeastern Brazil. His mother brought the family to the outskirts of Sao Paulo Guaruja 60 kilometres away on a 13 day trip in an old pickup truck to leave the poor conditions in rural Brazil in 1952. By 1956 the had moved to Sao Paulo in the iparanga neighborhood. He worked at ascrew factory before joining a trade school Brazil's National School for Industrial Learning, studying to become a mechanical lathe worker, making him a metallurgist in 3 years. He then joined Industrial Villares, a large metallurgical company, in Sao Bernardo do Campo, ABC region of Sao Paulo.  This started his career as trade unionist in 1969 elected to the Board, 1972 elected First Secretary, and 1975 elected president of the Union of Workers of Sao Bernardo do Campo and Diadema, representing 100,000 workers. This was aperiod when the military dicatorship was beginning the proces of redemocratization of Brazil. Lula led strikes in 1980, formed the CUT Central Unica de Trabajodores in 1982, ran for Governor of Sao Paulo that year and in 1983 was elected to the Constituent Assembly. The Workers Party was founded on Feb. 10, 1980 during this period of redemocratization. Lular ran for elections as president losing to Cardozo twice in 1994, 1998 and wiining at ae 57 years in 2002.     ...

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Share of mortgages at least 30 days past due declined to 6.39% in the 4th quarter 2013, down from 7.09% a year ago, according to the Mortgage Bankers Association. Foreclosure inventory declined to 2.9% for 4th quarter 2013. Three fourths of the troubled loans are from the period before 2007. The improved economic situation and lower unemployment has helped. Also helping is the increase in prices, with home prices up 8.4% in Dec. 2013 over the prior year, according to Black Knight Financial Services. The price increase has reduced the number of homes "under water"- owing more than the homes are worth- from 19% in Jan 2013 to 11.4% in October, according to Black Knight. Banks have also tightened their lending practices. The progress is uneven with California and Arizona, some of the worst hit states doing better in 2013. Judicial states such as New York and Florida, where courts have to approve foreclosure by banks, are making gradual improvement. About 1.5% of California homes were in foreclosure by the end of 2013, compared to 8.5% in Florida, according to MBA. In 2014 price improvements are expected to slow, and the 10% of homes in various stages of delinquency or foreclosure still remain as a hangover from the housing crisis that slows U.S. economic recovery....

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On December 17 Kenneth Lewis CEO of Bank of America arranged a urgent meeting with Treasury's Paulson and the Fed's Bernanke to discuss unexpected losses in the billions at Merrill. Paulson and Bernanke persuaded Lewis not to scrap the deal and offered a $138 billion package not to scrap the deal. The deal then closed at $24 billion. Was it abad idea not to disclose the bad news immediately? It certainly proved to be the just that. In five trading days Bank of America's market capitalization dropped 45% wiping out a much bigger sum than the Merrill deal. Lewis says that the government was firm in its view that serious systemic harm would result if Bank of America did not close on the deal. Law suits from shareholders could result from this but says one legal expert a legal doctrine could emerge that in anational economic emergency companies are absolved from governance actions harmful to shareholders like nondisclosure of critical information. Which only shows how complicated situations can get once everythings spins out of control starting from the basic fact of bad opaque assets on the company's books, taking any form of rational action and behaviour with it with a million unpredictables....

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Tom Wright shows the results of an examination by the WSJ of the operations of 1Malaysia Development Fund BhD, setup in 2009 for economic development. This report shows lack of transparency and use of the state owned and operated fund to indirectly help the ruling UMNO party and prime minister Najib Razak in the tight 2013 Malaysian general elections. The 1MDB fund is becoming a huge controversy in Malaysia as the former head of the UNMO party and prime minister for 22 years Mr. Mahathir Mohammed, and the opposition parties in Malaysia, are questioning the lack of transparency at 1MDB fund and misuse of funds. Prime minister Najib Razak is chairman of the board of advisors of the fund. The problem is serious because of the $11 billion in debt of the fund- and the need to reschedule debt repayments. The financial report of the fund of March 31, 2014 shows interest costs taking up half of revenues. A $260 million emergency credit was provided by the government in 2015, and a Abu Dhabi state fund provided $1 billion, in an effort to meet loan repayments. Moody's Investors Service and private investment funds see the government eventually coming up with a bailout of 1MDB. Malaysia's currency the ringgit has lost 6% of its value in the first 6 months of 2015, and foreign investors are taking funds out of the country. On the questions of transparency the WSJ examination shows a questionable deal with the Genting Group which owns a casino in New York, and $ 4 billion casino in Las Vegas, plantations, real estate, and power plants in Malaysia. In one deal between Genting and 1MDB, a 75% interest in a power plant near Kuala Lumpur was bought at highly inflated prices, according to the WSJ examination. Genting is shown to have helped the UMNO in the Najib 2013 election campaign. 1MDB has also raised money just before the 2013 election with a $3 billion bond offering arranged by Goldman Sachs in March 2013. The United Malays National Organization (UMNO) party which openly favors Malays has ruled Malaysia for all the years since independence from Britain in 1957. In the 2013 election a key battleground was in Penang state which went to the opposition Democratic Action Party, and the UMNO failed to get a majority of the vote. It held onto government through electoral rules that gave a higher number of parliamentary seats for the rural areas where UMNO draws large support. The situation in Malaysia is unusual because power has shifted to opposition parties in most of the countries in the region- Indonesia, Philippines following dictatorships, Pakistan and Bangladesh following military rule, India and Japan following a long spell under the Congress party and the LDP. Only in Malaysia and Singapore have the UMNO and the PAP party of Lee Kuan Yew held on for almost 6 decades, by keeping opposition parties weak and not allowing a two party system to develop. Indonesia, another Muslim country, has moved ahead with free and fair elections with the recent election of Widodo as president, leading to significant efforts to improve infrastructure development and other parts of the economy. Experts say healthy two party systems and free elections provide economic benefits by giving voters a choice between competing economic plans for the future, as is seen in the higher future growth prospects under new leadership for India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Indonesia, the Philippines, and including Japan with the shift back to the LDP with Abe. Corruption, lack of transparency, and poor management of the economy, are major issues with entrenched parties. ...

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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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It is important for a correct sense of the Middle East to see these British Arab states from Kuwait to UAE and Qatar in the context of British India if one is to see them as part of the modern world as India is. This is now US policy under DJT and has been under Biden for a peaceful economically advanced region. A third of Arabian peninsula Arab protectorates were run from British India from 1800 onwards. The Interpretation Act of 1889 listed the states under British India in the Arabian peninsula including Kuwait, Bahrain, Aden now Yemen, Oman, Dubai, Abu Dhabi, and they were listed along with Jaipur, Hyderabad and Bhawalpur. British Prime minister Clement Attlee wanted to give independence to these Arab states along with the independence of India and Pakistan in 1947. But this did not happen till 1971. In 1937 the first of many separations from the British Empire in India of Arab states was announced. Aden, now Yemen, was separated from the British Empire in India to the Colonial Empire. British Empire authorites in Delhi never wanted to administer these Arab states even though the British Indian Political Service ran each of these states till 1971. They were very poor and lacking basic infrastructure, things changed only after the discovery of oil in late 1930's. ...

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John Lyons of the WSJ writes in this report from Seoul, South Korea, that president Moon may have inadvertently contributed to the sense of the futility of talking to South Korea about missile defense when he opposed the installation of the Thaad, Terminal high altitude missile system, in his election campaign. This led to the U.S. and the South Korean government of president Ms. Park moving ahead with the system before Moon was elected. Moon is a human rights lawyer who favored improved relations with North Korea. Domestic South Korean politics were decided by younger voters alienated by the existing business structure, leading to the conviction of president Park and later the head of Samsung on corruption charges, and the election of Mr. Moon. In foreign affairs the picture is quite different as Moon is seen in South Korea as not being consulted by the U.S. as it frames policy for the region. South Koreans call this "Korea passing." As U.S. and Japan are directly affected by North Korean missile tests, the most recent on August 29th passing over Japan, U.S. president Trump consults with Japanese prime minister Shinzo Abe. People in Japan are cited in the NYT as saying recently, that they knew they had to worry about earthquakes, but had not expected to have to worry about missiles. A recent report in NYT showed that most people in Seoul have not prepared seriously to use underground shelters because they do not believe a war could take place with Seoul only 35 miles from the North Korea border. The U.S. policy is now focused on working with China, and coordinating its policy with Japan. A U.S. anti ballistic missile test was conducted from the ship USS John Paul Jones on August 29th. Moon has changed his position and now supports Thaad missile defense. South Koreans are apparently resigned to the prospect of "Korea passing." ...

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After making headlines the issue of TikTok is no longer making news. Here is what has happened since- TikTok took the case to the Supreme Court after the Biden Administration's effort to bring it under US security with American ownership. The Supreme Court ruled in favor of the government. Social media helped Republicans and DJT in the election. DJT wanted TiTok to be an American company if it was to operate in US. China was opposed to this and would not allow ByteDance the owner of TikTok negotiate this-leading to an impasse. The DJT administration worked out a relationship  with China by September 2025 following tit for tat tariffs in May 2025. Xi's strategy was to put rare earths on the table after it had gained a 90% monopoly on rare earths processing technologies and supplies. Some supplies include a site in Greenland, so that the Greenland issue as opponents of US acquisition have made appear is not fiction. DJT Administration pulled back and negotiated a deal with China but realized how the US had left key gaps in its security which is why the Greenland issue came up in 2025. Similar to how Democrat president Harry Truman had done as the Soviets expanded influence in Greece and Turkey by 1948. Little of this making it to almost the entire US press and the entire European press, including Democrat Harry Truman's 1947 offer of $100 million ($1.5 billion in 2026) for Greenland, rights, title and ownership similar to Alaska purchase by Seward, and US Virgin Islands purchase in 1916 from Denmark.   The deal makes TikTok an American/ China investor run company with Byte Dance ownership of 20%, Oracle 15%, Silverlake US equity firm 15%, Abu Dhabhi (UK type) MGX 15%, and prior investors 30%. Prior investors are General Atlantic, SIG, Steve Case's Revolution with JD Vance having equity, Dragoneer, NJJ Capital. The company now valued at $20 billion based on 200 million US users. Yet this does not address the dangers and damage done by social media hours for youth in the US, endless hours from education shifted to phones and social media videos. Australia has banned it for under 16 year olds, UK parliament has voted to ban, French parliament has also voted for a ban, China has strict rules that protect its youth for use specifying hours and restrictions, leaving the US and India, Brazil vulnerable to dangers of social media. Strictly speaking You Tube is considered as social media even though it serves an information function, Facebook and TikTok are where a lot of the damage to education takes place in social media. US is entirely leaving its young people especially women unprotected. Once the fentanyl issue is tackled attention will again focus on these dangers to creating good citizens in the US  with civic education if democracy is to be preserved, something endless numbers of lobbyists- which even in Teddy Roosevelt's and FDR's, JFK's days have opposed- will again oppose.     ...

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In his foreign policy address following the northeast state primaries Donald Trump outlines a policy with less foreign engagement in trouble spots, and greater reliance on partners in Europe and Asia contributing to joint defense. It also includes building up the military and nuclear arsenal. It criticizes the Bush administration for intervention in Iraq that benefitted Iran, and the Obama administration for policies that led to the rise of Islamic State. Because Trump is not for supporting foreign engagements in trouble spots the difference in Trump's policies is not announcing or signalling in advance what U.S. response would be, instead keeping it unpredictable. It is not clear how much this would work given that any president would inherit the situation before him, and also the complexity of the situation would not change, such as the need to have Iranian cooperation and Saudi cooperation to tackle Islamic State. The Bush administration started with a similiar intention to focus on domestic policy, till the 9/11 surprise attack steered it away towards nationbuilding overseas. The pendulum swung in the latter years of the Bush adminstration to the Iraq intervention, Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo, followed by a swing in the other direction to allowing Libya and Syria disntegrate leading to millions of refugees. Complexity, surprises, and swings of popular opinion, are unlikely to go away, even as caution is exercized and military capabilities enhanced....

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The Netherlands government of prime minister Mark Rutte collapsed on April 22, 2012, after the Freedom party of Geert Wilders said it would not support futher budget cuts. Mr. Wilders said: "We don't want our pensioners to bleed just to meet the dictates coming from Brussels." Government forecasts had predicted the Netherlands deficit at 4.6% of GDP in 2012, above the 3% goal set by the European Union. And negotiations that collapsed were about making $18 billion in budget cuts to help meet the deficit goal. Rutte will now lead a caretaker government till elections in September or October 2012. Credit agencies may lower the Netherlands credit ratings from AAA and this would raise Netherlands borrowing costs in coming months. The result would be to increase the deficit even further. The Netherlands government was a strong supporter of Germany to introduce strict austerity measures and budget cuts in the eurozone during the debt crisis in EU countries in 2010-2011. With the elections in France and the defeat of French president Sarkozy in the first phase of elections by Socialist candidate Francois Hollande, the austerity programs in Europe appear to be unravelling. The deeper Europe goes into a recession in 2012-2013, the more likely new measures will be needed to address competitiveness, growth, interest rates and overvalued currencies as opposed to largely fiscal and budget measures alone....

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Manuela Mesco's interview with Giovanni Ferrero, CEO of Italy's chocolate company, Ferrero SpA, in Nov. 2013. Ferrero outlines his plans to double the company's sales by expanding outside of Europe where it now gets 80% of sales. Euromonitor estimates show Ferrero with 8% share of the world chocolate market compared to Nestle's 12%. Ferrero SpA's sales are 8 billion euros for 2013. The company started with a small store in Alba, near Turin, Italy in 1942. Its hazelnut and chocolate spread Nutella is a popular product in Europe. Ferrero has expanded by about 45% since 2006, with rising sales of the Nutella and Kinder brands. A path Ferrero plans to take is expanding sales in China and other Asian markets, following up on the popularity of its Rocher brand of chocolates in China. The problems Ferrero faces in the U.S. is the presence of big established competitors Hershey and Cadbury, a fragmented distribution chain, and the uphill task of convincing peanut butter users to try Nutella for breakfast, and snacks. Ferrero is a family owned company and Giovanni Ferrero plans to keep it that way, seeing new opportunities in the chocolate and food market that the Italian company can take advantage of. In doing so he hopes to generate enough growth to compete effectively as an independent family owned company with Nestle and Hershey....

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Tabuchi provides an exceptional account of the difficulties overcome by Rieko Fukushima as she returned from maternity leave to setup the 3-D TV team at Toshiba to commercialize the technology. Her inventive skills, networking and collaboration with other parts of Toshiba, hard work and perseverance paid off when her team solved the problem of being able to view the 3-D television without glasses. The solution was a new algorithm based on Toshiba processer Cell that sent different images to the left and right eyes. Here she describes the astonishment with which her team received the news that a woman was in charge of the team, just returning from maternity leave, and only 39! Was it tough as a woman? Yes, she says! Rieko was exceptional in many ways. Japan's challenge is to get more women with even a fraction of Rieko's talent to make a huge difference in a country where women play a minor role in positions of responsibility and initiative at all levels. It would make a large difference in Japan's prospects in the global economy- about 8.2 million more workers, and an estimated 15% increase in GNP....

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Growing number of parttime workers and poverty levels in Japan. About 16% of the population in Japan lives on an income that is half the national median income, which is the way the government defines poverty. OECD studies in 2011 show Japan as sixth from the bottom of 34 members of the OECD. The poor quality of jobs is worsening the problem of the working poor, just as it is in the U.S. with lower wage manufacturing jobs and very low wage jobs in retail/ restaurant industries. Experts say the problem has worsened since 2012 when prime minister Abe was elected. Since 2012 the number of part time or irregular workers without permanent contracts has increased by 1.5 million, with parttime workers at 20 million, or 40% of the Japanese workforce. They point to the parental support with many young workers living at home, as is true also of Spain and Italy, that has mitigated their difficult situation. This piece in the Economist provides insights into the condition of parttime lower wage workers in Japan, a large number of whom are young people, a situation similiar to that in some European countries such as Spain and Italy. At the very low end as Japanese local and national governments- under pressure to cut spending with its high debt- reduce benefits, more people have been added to the welfare rolls with 2 million people now on welfare....