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Scott Bessent Treasury Secretary told the Economic Club of New York on Tuesday evening that the founders knew something more enduring than what we have come up with in the last couple of decades with chips and other technologies- " "The founders understood something far more enduring: that the fortunes of a nation are shaped by the energies of its people. Those energies transformed a small republic on the edge of a continent into the most prosperous nation in the long sweep of human civilization." We should never forget this, and we should make the energies of the American people and how it affects them the core of everything we do.  America's strengths lie not just in its natural resources and the depth of its capital markets it lies in the conditions, the character, capacity of its people- "It resides most of all in the character and the capacity of our people: the entrepreneur with an idea, the worker who can master new trades and technologies, institutions with the freedom and confidence to flourish." We must remember Bessent says what Alexander Hamilton as one of the founders in the 1780's taught us about possessing within us all the essentials of national supply, so that we produce what we need- "Alexander Hamilton taught us: that every nation “ought to endeavor to possess within itself all the essentials of national supply.” Our strength is derived from what we can build, for the nation that can’t produce what it needs isn’t truly secure. The nation that depends on its adversaries for critical inputs isn’t truly sovereign. And the nation that reduces its economics to consumption isn’t truly prosperous." Access to cheap supplies of goods is not what the American Dream was and is about from the beginning of the settlement of this continent in 1620's and throughout the period before and after independence for 400 years.  "Access to cheap goods is not the essence of the American Dream. The American Dream is rooted in the concept that any citizen can achieve prosperity, upward mobility, and economic security. For too long, the designers of multilateral trade deals have lost sight of this. International economic relations that do not work for the American people must be re-examined." ...

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Vice President Vance's attempted thaw in relations with Iran (the Memorandum) and the Iranian response in missile strikes to interrupt open navigation in Hormuz on Omani side route breaking ceasefire happens on July 8, 2026. Early on in the US strikes the focus was on Iranian underground nuclear sites with preparations for nuclear weapons. When Iran shut down the Hormuz channel to navigation the US extended this to a naval blockade. As the US bombing of military targets in Iran continued in May and June the WSJ and other media were critical of the US. DJT turned to JD Vance to get the Iranians to negotiate a ceasfire with a Memorandum of points they agreed to included a plan to have talks on nuclear issue, open up the Hormuz channel, lift American naval blockade and American sanctions to Iranian oil exports. This WSJ Editorial Board commentary says Iran has not acted on as it said it would - no talks on nuclear issue are started, and Iran launched missiles against shipping in Hormuz.  This WSJ editorial says Iran does not intend to open Hormuz or discontinue its nuclear weapons efforts. In this situation the only options for the US are to find alternative sources for oil for India and Japan, and China in tacit cooperation with the US to find alternative sources as well as make more efficient use of oil. China is now doing without the 4 million barrels it was getting from Hormuz and has decided to do without these supplies altogether. For the UAE and Saudis to find alternative routes to get most of the oil out, UAE to increase output outside of OPEC to reduce prices. All of these actions are taking place and the ceasefire offered a breather for that to get established creating a new situation where if Hormuz remains unopened the rest of the world will be able to go on as before without being seriously affected. Better management of overall oil supplies is already taking place, inventories are building up, so that at some point Hormuz does not affect oil prices significantly. This is the best and most realistic option and the US, China, India, Japan, the EU, are going ahead with it. ...

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EU's Leyen and Costa at India's Republic Day Parade 2026 with PM Modi. European Union's Leyen said on her visit to India with Da Costa- "We are on the cusp of a historic trade Agreement indeed some call it the mother of all deals one that would create a market of two billion people." "A free trade agreement between the EU and India would be the largest deal of this kind anywhere in the world. I am well aware it will not be easy. But I also know that timing and determination counts, and that this partnership comes at the right moment for both of us." Leyen concluded that this was a moment that seemed so opportunity filled for both regions. "In troubled times great opportunities come. And I believe 2025 is a historic window of opportunity to build an indivisible partnership between Europe and India. Our interests align. Our commitment is iron-clad. And if it can be done anywhere, it can be done here. Because as Romain Rolland – the French writer and great admirer of India said: “If there is one place on the face of earth where all the dreams of living men have found a home from the very earliest days when man began the dream of existence, it is India.”  "And today we are one step closer to making our common dream a reality. Thank you and long live our friendship." ...

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WSJ Quiz on data centers- test your knowledge. Does China have the most data centers? No the US with 4000, followed by Britain with 515 and Germany with 500 showing that China is not in the AI craze the way the US is even though the idea of the US falling behind in AI is used to get trillions of dollars in AI funding. This only means infrastructure that is dilapidated and broken in the US will not be replaced, and that the US plan to reindustrialize to get jobs will lack funding as dollars are diverted from these essential and vital needs to AI. Eventually Asian countries with new infrastructure will find ways to get that US technology without having to pay for it. The American public will be paying for this AI craze. We at Lyrarc.com checked how many data centers China has built? The number is 250 data centers are operational and note this in the MIT Technology Review it says 80% of these data centers are not being used, there is 80% overcapacity in China. Because China's AI such as Deep Seek is designed so that it uses less computing power. What this means is that only the US will put over 3 times the combined data centers put in by China, UK and Germany for AI and US will put in 16 times the data centers China has put in. As China only needs or is using 20% of its 250 operational data centers or 50 data centers the US is putting in 80 times the data center capacity China is using in 2026. Why 80 times? Because China has a Plan and it can manage the supply to the need or demand. In the US each company is trying to put so many in so it can get the leadership position in the market. For example Amazon puts in $200 billion instead of the $100 billion it can afford simply to be in the leadership ranks. There is much wasteful spending in the US market system than China's coordinated effort in a new technology even though ideologues like to say the US system is superior, and a plan by the state is frowned upon in the US, costing the US dearly when it lost its entire manufacturing base to China while economists said everything was OK. Even the WSJ Quiz fails to ask the question we asked about China and how many data centers China has actually made operational, how much is overcapacity- 250 datacenters and 80% overcapacity. Showing how little the public knows and even WSJ has looked into, giving a few companies such as Google, Amazon, Apple, Microsoft and others the freedom to spend in a reckless way so that future infrastructure investments and reindustrialization investments will be crowded out in the US economy. And economists as usual will say its OK. ...

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Being able to do the yoga pose of standing on one foot for ten seconds or twenty seconds is very important for your health. The one legged prayer pose is one of the most important of the yoga poses and one that will be done everywhere on World Yoga Day.

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Under the Biden vaccine mandate federal government employees and employees of contractors face termination, suspension or warnings, if they do not get vaccinated in 75 days. There is no option for them to take testing. For employers in the private sector there is a weekly testing option if needed and requirement that employees get vaccinated in 75 days.

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Michigan Governor Whitmer, a Democrat, says she supports tariffs in a state hit hard by offshoring of American factories and loss of jobs leading to decay of small towns depending on factories. She says tariffs should be done in a way that do not increase cost of living for workers and families. Whitmer calls for distribution of tariff revenues to workers and small businesses hit by tariff related price increases in this op-ed in the Washington Post. DJT has called for a $2000 rebate to go to American workers and their families and all who are impacted by tariffs using the tariff revenues in 2025 and 2026 estimated at $550 billion. Expect to see this money to go out to workers before the midterm elections. 

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Le Monde reports from Havana Cuba in 2026- 2 million people have left since 2021, the situation is looking increasingly hopeless. There is the 800,000 called the "walking generation" that walked to th southern border of the US during the Biden administration 2020-2024, How did this happen the country of Cuba losing so many people, a third of its population? In 1960 it was 7.1 million. Taking Mexico as an example Mexico's population was 37 million in 1960, it is now 133 million up threefold. At the same rate Cuba's today would be about 20 million in 2026, today it is about 10 million. Instead of 20 million it is half that. About 3 million left the country and population growth simply stopped as the country went from crisis to crisis. Was the revolution worth it, were people in Europe, the US and Latin America who looked to Cuba as a model completely mistaken and was the story oversold to the point where someone like Chavez would try to bring that revolution to a developed economy such as Venezuela as late as 1998, when Cuba was already without US cooperation a state that had fallen behind, by 2026 it was like going back in time 50 years. Could the US offer something better to these countries in the western hemisphere. Did Kennedy JFK promise so much in 1960 and did later US administrations leave Cuba  in a state where it would not get foreign investment and be sanctioned and blocked from access to new technology in so many ways. There is much to reflect on the failure of Cuba, the story of glorious narrative that was told that overlooks the poor condition of the country and benefitted the people the least.  ...

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Puerta Vallarta and American expatriates 2026. WSJ reports in Feb 25, 2026 that most of the Mexican states and the Cancun, Tulum, Puerta Vallarta and other coastal tourist areas are controlled by different drug cartels. 

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See who qualified and how for World Cup 2026 in the US in this detailed report in The Guardian.

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Ed Sisken, a seasoned lawyer who worked at the White House for Obama, then worked for the mayor of Chicago Rahm Emmanuel, is president Biden's new White House Counsel. This report says there will be a higher bar for information that a small wing of the Republican party will seek from the White House for impeachment inquiry on president Biden. It is seen as largely political agreed to reluctantly by Republican Speaker McCarthy. Coming in the presidential election year of 2024 when Mr. Trump faces hearings on indictments, this is expected to involve media attention.

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How we age is up to us. You are able to do the plank at 70 because you are doing it at age 50. Dr. Norman Lazarus is a professor at Kings College, London, and is 84 years. It is all up to us, what we eat, how we get our exercize and aur work life balance. Dr. Norman Lazarus says about ageing that our appoach to it is totally inadequate and that ageing has not much to do with genetics. If one eats healthy food and exercizes well then many of the diseases we hear about at older age are just lifestyle diseases that one does not have to worry about, even if one gets one of the diseases the recovery will be faster. He says eat well, move a lot and also enjoy yourself. Enjoy yourself to keep cheerful which stimulates the brain. He is the author of "The Lazarus Strategy: How to Age Well and Wisely."  In Lazarus view the last 25 years can be miserable or without disease depending on what we do. Diseases of ageing are not inevitable he says, its rubbish he says and it makes him cry, it is just that it takes 25 years for all that neglect of exercize and not eating healthy to reach a critical point. It is also not that some people are better than others. Lazarus found himself at age 50 putting on weight till he made the decision one day at lunch with his wife.  A a non competitive long distance cyclist Lazarus has done studies which show cyclists over 70 years having the immunity and fat level of 20 year olds. Nothing is written, we have to write it ourselves. ...

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Importance of hearing aids and using ear plugs near loud noises in avoiding early dementia. Other actions to prevent early dementia are wearing helmets to protect from brain injury, getting vision checked, engage your core when sitting and getting every 20 minutes, long walks or hikes, checking cholesterol, maintaining good sleep habits. The expression "use it or lose it" is key if vision, hearing, body movement is not used one loses it and with it the paths to social connections that the brain needs for stimulating its function. Maintaining good sleep and food, exercise habits shows that overall health has much to do with mental health.

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Consider the number 76%. That is how many of the population of Ghana that are at risk of drinking contaminated water. Today March 22 is World Water Day. Ghana is one of Africa's better developed regions, which suggests that much of Africa is also at 76%, and it may also be true for much of Asia outside of China and now India with PM Modi's Jal Jeevan Mission, and for Latin America. Nothing could be more vital than water and it shows how little is known outside India of Jal Jeevan and what it does for 1.4 billion people, that it does not get mentioned in UNESCO's report. Behind this is the will and tenacity and a belief that it can be done that clean tap water can reach every household in India once resources are set aside to do it and it is executed on time.

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Managers need to take care that they do not become insulated, and do become insensitive to the workplace and workers, as this can lead to making costly mistakes, says Rosabeth Kanter. Kanter says this has led many top managers to distance themselves from the workplace, feel entitled, and think they are indispensable, leading to mistakes that led to them resigning in the last 2 years.

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West Bengal gets a new start after 50 years of mismanagement, corruption and breakdown of law and order, and economic failures, with a new BJP Modi led administration. The speed of the changes are simply astonishing as a state of close to 100 million people -where industrialization never took off as it has in other states, and rural poverty exists in ways thought to belong to the colonial days under the British- gets an administration at the federal level under Modi committed to industrialization, modernization of the economy, on the same rapid scale as that launched in the rest of eastern India. This is a territory half the size of the European Union, once called the Bengal Presidency under the British Empire, comprised of states of Bihar, Orissa, West Bengal, Assam, and Andhra Pradesh, a region where the Ganges and Brahmaputra rivers from the mighty Himalayas flow into the sea. It is a low moment for India similar to the period after the Proleterian Cultural Revolution of Mao in China by 1970 and the few remaining leaders under premier Chou-en-lai making a resolute effort under Deng Xiaoping to make a new effort to modernize and industrialize China working with the US and the European Union. That effort went through the initial phase to 1990 to familiarize Communist China with the US and European market systems, and a new phase to 2010 by which time most of these goals had been achieved. India is poised to make that scale of change today over the next two decades as it is already familiarized with the US and European market systems and its net step is in technological advancement and rapid industrialization at scale something that alone can meet the aspirations of the South Asian region. ...

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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.     ...