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Robert Lighthizer, U.S. Trade Representative, makes a passionate plea for the dignity of work in America, the founding principle for the society of opportunity that America has been and the reason it was settled by immigrants from Europe over 200 years. He points out that trade policy is not about geopolitics or about efficiency as others perceive, it is about what kind of society we want to live in. Is it about a society of opportunity? This is the foundation on which this American continent was settled by settlers from Britain and Europe, and the basis of the growth over two hundred years till the last four decades. From 2000 and China's entry into the World Trade Organization under president Clinton to 2016 the U.S. manufacturing base has shrunk with the loss of five million jobs, two million jobs lost to China in the period 1999-2011 alone. And 350,000 automobile manufacturing jobs to Mexico since 1994, one third of all U.S. automobile jobs. Without the initiative and hard work of Mr. Lighthizer both American workers and Mexican workers would be stuck in low paying jobs. The USMCA he negotiated changed all that by giving Mexican workers fair wages and American workers and manufacturing the opportunity for revival.  This view was also expressed by Intel founder Andy Grove, a founder of one of the first pioneer companies in Silicon Valley. Grove asked the question after seeing the outsourcing of production out of America and the condition of the American worker- he said for him it was about what kind of society he wanted to live in. It was all about the dignity of the American worker long ignored by economists who live in a world of theory and the elite that has lived for so long apart from the places where the fabric of American workers and working life was torn apart. It was a question that touched Andy Grove's heart just as it does for Robert Lighthizer and others who are fighting to make America a society of opportunity for the American worker and opportunity for the American people, for dignity in America. It also charts a new course for the French worker, the British worker, the Indian worker, as other countries learn from the American experience. We have covered Grove and Lighthizer from the early days of their leadership and wise reminders to the people of what America is and stands for. Lighthizer points out one huge error that makes the thinking of these economists and elite that have not listened for so long, more than a bit crazy, reckless and callous. He says there about half of 250 million adults who lack a college diploma in America. Historically manufacturing has provided stable well paying employment. Even if with investment in education they were taught to write software code, there aren't enough jobs for them. The combined total of jobs at Apple Google, Facebook and Netflix is 300,000 jobs. Never has so much been at stake for so many and defended by so few. ...

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Because of anti Bush and anti american feeling every crank politicain or simply gangs fighting turf wars and even bandits or thieves can call themselves Taliban. Also the Wahabist religion of militants is not the religion in the Sind and Punjab 2 main provinces of Pakistan. And some of these areas like the Northwest frontier province and the areas bordering Afghanistan like Afghanistan itself have an independent streak and don't take well to any foreigner be it the Russians, the Pakistanis (Punjabis and Sindhis) and to the Americans or going back to the colonial era the British. Its convenient and a easy label for a lazy media that hasnt done its homework, and for politicians who lack the education and disposition to do their own homework or a cultural barrier that makes this difficult to call all this one label Taliban, or some other label, but its dangerous as the manner of dealing with this may be quite different given a correct understanding of whats happening. When turned over to the American people living in a modern world or to modern world Europeans for response to these labels there is only the gut instinct of them versus us the core feeling of something different and alien which is hostile. As this writer points out the Pakistani people themselves by and large are simply like people everywhere, may just be looking for better lives like the rest of us, and are not keen on the militants though they may carry anti Bush feelings. And the Pakistani people resentment for the USA not because of some innate or inherent hostility but because they feel left out of the modern world and its benefits of development like infrastructure, hospitals and basic services, just like most of the developing countries, which have alternated between hostility and friendship towards the USA, just as the USA has alternated between truly benevolent policy towards the developing world and policy thats more in tune to a prior colonial period of its partners in Europe like the British and the French. And in this sense the Pakistani people desire for economic progress may not be automatically construed as expressed through the politicians as they are corrupt and selfserving. Its a complex state of affairs sure but its not made easier but made more complicated by lazy man's labels without understanding the situation on the ground first hand and doing one's homework. ...

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The situation in Afghanistan is deteriorating. It's worsening compared to Iraq. More deaths in roadside bombings than Iraq in recent months, and rural areas in the south and east no longer in the control of the Karzai government. And opium crops not under any control and growing substantially in 2007. The US Defense department is conducting a thorough review of the situation in Afghanistan. The ceasefire between militants in Pakistan's border areas and the Pakistan army also has led to increased activity along the Pakistan border as Pakistan militants cross the border into Afghanistan, and the Pakistan tribal border areas acting as sanctuary for the Taliban militants. Meanwhile Obama and McCain see the situation differently. McCain sees Iraq as important and Obama would withdraw from Iraq and concentrate on Afghanistan and send 8000 more troops to Afghanistan, something that may happen if he is elected and the situation in Afghanistan deteriorates further.

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Detailed account of who the Taliban leaders in Afghanistan and Pakistan are, their manner and tactics. The situation now on the ground with the Taliban and their statements and strategy.

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As the US gets serious about defeating the Taliban and Al Quaeda militants in Afghanistan and in Pakistan's border areas in Waziristan and the Northwest Frontier Province, and as Pakistan's army and government are at loggerheads and are also each in its own way unable or unwilling to take action against these militants operating out of or near the border areas between Afghanistan and Pakistan, it appears that the situation will result in the US having to make some tough decisions including going ahead anyway regardless of agreement with Pakistan. At the same time Defense Secretary Gates is saying that he wnats to see the Afghan army numbers to be doubled from the present 65,000 to be able to spread out across the country and not just be stuck in the urban areas. Any success the US and NATO see in Afghanistan would stem from some of these tough decisions including some tough decisions of a different nature that deal with Afghan government provincial officials tacit involvement in the opium growing areas. Like Iraq this will be a tough one for the US and the Europeans to sort out and make take a lot of patience and effort and some disappointments on the road before serious and lasting results that do not compromise basic American and European goals and intentions. With these goals and intentions the American and the Europeans seek to leave behind a peaceful modernizing state keeping its own faith and traditions with tolerance for others, at the same time that it respects women and economic development and modern education in science and technology that would make this development possible. And these goals would have to be applied as the vital test for the whole region Iran, Afghanistan, Pakistan, and India and for the basis of all policy towards the region, foreign policy, economc policy, development policy and regional issue policy like that of Kashmir. ...

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Germany will provide 140 million euros in extra funding for Syrian refugees and at least 500 million euros in humanitarian and development aid for 2015-2017, according to Foreign Minister Steinmeier.

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Map shows new troop deployments for tens of thousands of new troops (20 to 30 thousand) to be sent to Afghanistan under the new strategy to salvage the situation there. All of these new troops will go into the countryside and especially in the opium growing region in the south and Helmand valley region. And also on the border with Pakistan. This will effectively double the number of American troops in Afghanistan. The boom in growing opium in the south has increased the funding of Taliban insurgents to hire new trrops and to get new weapons.

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Peter Orszag's role in the healthcare debate and the formulation of health care policy proposals. One proposal of Orszag, who heads the Congressional Budget Office, is to set up a new agency with powers to cut spending and implement changes in Medicare. Says Orszag, "one of the reasons we have such disjointed and skewed incentives is that we have an excessively political process." At a recent meeting with House Democrats, one Congresswoman said her top priority is winning higher payments for oxygen suppliers, and Orszag was taken aback. For years officials have been trying to cut payments to oxygen and medical equipment suppliers, which are said to be inflated. When a new competitive bidding process was set to take effect last year, industry supporters in Congress were able to delay the plan, and these supporters are still fighting to block changes says the WSJ. Here is a 40 year old Orszag, with degrees from Princeton and London School of Economics, who got his early experience in the Clinton adminstration at age 24. He then followed this with a number of policy oriented jobs, ending with appointment to head CBO in 2007. And he faces the whole system of Congressmen from both parties beholden to interests in the healthcare industry, who provide the donations for them to finance their election campaigns. Dan Eggen describes this in the Washington Post, 7/21/2009. Max Baucus of Montana, and to some extent Grassley of Iowa, are senators from both parties who Eggen points out are beholden to the healthcare industry because of large donations they receive from the interests in the healthcare industry. These interests want to see their payments system protected. The further escalation in health care costs, which would make the whole healthcare system unaffordable even as it delivers poor results, can only be prevented by making cost control an exercize that is not influenced by healthcare industry donations. Jackie Calmes describes the huge hurdles in achieving a deficit neutral move to universal health care in the U.S. in the NYT 6/26/2009. See the link. The exchange between Grassley and Orszag on the issue of the $177 billion in savings needed from the payments to health insurers under the Medicare managed care plans- which allow seniors to obtain Medicare coverage outside the government run program -went as follows. These are dubbed overpayments by outside experts and efforts have been made to cut them in Congress. When Mr Grassley raised concerns about the impact of such cuts in a hearing, -and Grassley has opposed the cut for this overpayment to insurers- Orszag responded saying: "I very firmly believe that capitalism is not founded on excessively high subsidies to private firms. This is what this system delivers right now." ...

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The narcotics revenue source is only one of three sources, says Defense Sec Gates. The other two are funds generated locally from the Pashtun minority in Pakistan, and funds generated from outside sources like people in Saudi Arabia and Kuwait. A 2006 World Bank report says the hawala system- an informal money transfer system using a network of money brokers with little oversight- "carries out the majority of the country's cash payments and transfers." Of the local sources, its only now that the Pakistan government is making a serious effort to freeze these bank accounts traced to the Taliban. The CIA says it has identified the charities and organizations that send money, but it is not clear if these sources have been suspended. The implications of this is that the war could be sustained by the Taliban even if the opium crop was destroyed, or smuggling routes and labs were destroyed. Gates points out that the very same external funding channels for sending money by wealthy Muslims that the US supported in the 1980's to help Muslim militants expel the Russians may still be open today. His comment that "it would't surprise me if some of those channels were still open today," suggests that even the Defense Dept does not know how these channels operate because of their extreme secrecy. In a way this shows how the war and the people that the US supported have come back to hurt the US, just as the people on the Pakistani side find that the people they supported in the Afghan and tribal areas and the Taliban organization they created is now coming back to hurt Pakistan. What makes it deeply disconcerting is that as Gates points out, there is so little time before the patience of the American public wears out with rising casualties. And on the Pakistani side there is so little time also because the war is spreading to Pakistani cities. See the link to The Taliban's war on the ill trained Pakistani police forces across the country in the WSJ May 28, 2009. ...

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Finnish president Niinisto provides a new understanding of Mr. Putin and the thinking that led to the invasion of Ukraine. Mr. Niinisto has an advantage having spoken with Mr. Putin countless times says this report in WSJ, and spoke again to Mr. Putin on May 14 to tell him that Finland was planning to join NATO. Putin simply responded that Russia does not pose a threat and "you made a mistake." He says it was not the Finnish way to not call Putin and tell him directly, and that not doing so would be like sneaking away around the corner. Mr. Niinisto says WSJ, has a rare insight into the thinking that led to the behavior of Mr. Putin in launching the war. Here are some insights from this report by Adam O'Neal of WSJ. On the situation in Ukraine Niinisto says " I would be a lot more worried about Ukrainians than about how Russians feel." Mr. Putin's willingness to see Ukraine's industrial centers, its infrastructure and cities destroyed, turning them into moon craters in the east compares with the relative ease of life in Moscow, St Petersburg and other cities, cushioned by Russian oil and gas exports and financial reserves. As a student of Finland's long and violent history with Russia Mr. Niinisto has some unique insights into Russian thinking. He tells WSJ's Adam O'Neal  that if a Russian is angry, yes, be careful, but if he's calm, be even more careful. The Russian invasion of Finland led to loss of 200,000 lives in 1939-40, and another 250,000 Russian lives in fighting between 1941-1944. Finland has 300,000 men or women in military reserves and men between 18 years and 60 years are called up for military service with the Finnish Constitution requiring every citizen to contribute to national defense. Recently Finland ordered 64 F-35 fighter jets from the US. What led to the invasion of Ukraine by Mr. Putin? Niinisto says that "somehow Mr. Putin has a feeling that Russia was betrayed in the 90's by the West. Over time this thinking continued feeding the negativity says Niinisto and led to the thinking that Russia could be betrayed once more.  Another aspect of Mr. Putin which was covered during the last decade of relations with Ukraine in Lyrarc, was his perception that Ukraine under various leaders before Zelensky was basically led by corrupt leaders including one president he supported but lost power in the last decade. Mr. Putin saw protests in Kviv and Lviv that ousted a president he supported recently as orchestrated from outside. This led to thinking that Ukrainian nationalism did not exist and he believed that Kviv would not be defended and would fall easily within a week or weeks. As his nationalist perceptions and that of a small group that included his partner in office Mr. Medvedev became stronger in the last ten years Mr. Putin made the decision to take the option for invasion in the thinking that the response of the US and Germany would not be to support Ukraine with arms and other aid. The CDU and SPD was perceived as weak in Germany and Scholz not seen as able to cut down oil and gas imports to the EU. Biden was seen as not willing to stop Russia by taking on a difficult conflict because of China allying itself with Russia, considering China's interconnections with the American economy. The timing was seen as good considering that this level of dependence on oil and gas imports of Europe on Russia would never be the case after planned shifts to renewable energy. The Russian economy was cushioned by its $620 billion in reserves and by the world's need for energy even as the shift to renewable was taking place. This window my have induced Mr. Putin to take what appeared to be a rational decision that ignored the common feelings of humanity of risking the destruction of a brotherly people that spoke Russian, prayed in Orthodox churches, and where Russia as a state started in the year 1000. Cambridge historian Brendan Simms in his new book "Europe : The Struggle for Supremacy 1453 to the present," has shown all European powers susceptible of reasoning and calculation of this type in their wars since 1453 in the struggle for supremacy in Europe up to the present- the Portuguese, the Spanish, the Dutch, the British, the French, the Germans, the Russians, the Danes, the Swedes. This also led to British and French empires in Asia and Africa with subjugation of Asian and African people. The Second World War had created the perception that somehow this had changed after the loss of millions of lives- that was the perception of Merkel a pastor's daughter who had grown up in the former communist state of GDR in East Germany, and of SPD leader Steinmeier who felt strongly about the loss of lives from the Nazi invasion. Merkel and Steinmeier built the relationship of Germany with Russia that has collapsed under Germany's new leader Scholz and Habeck-Baerbock of the Greens party. Merkel and Steinmeier also built the trade relationship with China that also faces collapse with China's support of Russia under Mr. Jinping, and the unexpected shifts in Chinese leadership and policies from that pursued by premier Deng and his successors in 1990-2010 of interconnected economic links with US and EU. Mr. Scholz, the new chancellor of Germany has Brendan Simms book on Europe on his reading list for 2022 as he ponders over the lessons of 2022 and the pandemic. Mr. Biden with long experience in the Senate of the US has a memory and understanding of what happened since World War II, how America got to this point, and what it will have to do to bring back the American spirit to the Free World that America has led for most of the last two hundred years. ...

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A 60% turnout in the election in Kashmir with the National Conference Party under Omar Abdullah winning 28 seats out of 87 seats, and the People's Democratic Party winning 21 seats and the Congress Party winning 17 seats. A coalition between the Congress party and the National Conference party is expected. The turnout in Srinagar the main city was 20%, higher than the 5% in 2002, which suggests that the terrorism in Kashmir is focussed in areas like Srinagar and in the rest of the country including rural districts the people are looking for ways to improve their lives free of the violence and poverty resulting from the insurgency.

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Graham Allison of the Kennedy school of Government at Harvard and John Deutsch former head of the CIA under Clinton and now a Professor at MIT, say it would be adesirable thing that Afghanistan develop into a prosperous, poppy-free and democratic country, but it is not vital for American interests. They say lets face it, one cannot push Afghistan into modernity overnight, just because we wish it. It would be atragic mistake to do so, and take a huge and ultimately failing effort to do this, with a vast expenditure of American blood and money, to do this. One can expect for Afghanistan after we exit to revert to conditions that exist in other countries at the same level of development, like Bangladesh, Sudan, Somalia. Allison sees a vital interest at stake in Pakistan because of nuclear weapons.

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John Holmes the UN deputy secretary general and relief coordinator says after a 4 day situation that the situation in Afghanistan is deteriorating. Afghanistan's food needs he says are very great considering the worsening food situation cause by world food prices surging and by the loss of about 40% of Afghanistan's wheat crop from drought that has affected food producing areas. The UN appealed 6 months earlier for $400 million in food aid to meet the needs of 4.5 million people or 14% of the people and for seeds and fertilizer to increase food production. Complicating food delivery is the worsening security situation with 432 deaths to insurgent attacks, and 62% rise in civilian deaths, displacement of 160,000 people.

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Musharraf's efforts at economic growth were not broad enough or deep enough to create a measurable difference in the lives of the Pakistani people. And improvements in industry and agriculture may have been shallow compared to the potential. The wars or conflicts one or the other with India and the failure of political leaders may have been too big a distraction to achieve the significant effort needed to make a serious improvement in the lives of ordinary people and grow the middle class. Inflation is up by 24% year to year in July and rising, which is really an intolerable burden in a poor developing country. Now what little progress was made in Pakistan for the lives of ordinary people and the middle class is unraveling in the face of increase in the price of food, and fuel. And the the fall in the value of the Pakistan ruppee to Rs 75 for one American dollar, a 24% decline in value since January 2008 in only 8 months, shows a serious loss of confidence in the economy. The fall in the foreign exchange reserves is striking from $16 billion in November to $9.92 billion at this time. Pakistan appears to be heading in the direction of a serious refocussing of its economy, its politics, its educational institutions, and government and private industry, and its military in the direction of improving the lives of ordinary people, building industry and agriculture and building its infrastructure. If left unattended this crisis can only get worse and none of the past experience the old military approaches, the religious politics, the corruption in politics, the old political slogans, the conflict building with India, is going to be of much help in tackling the real day to day problems of improvement in industry, agriculture, infrastructure, and building better lives....

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US National Intelligence report due after the November elections confirms much of the British Ambassador's cable to the French from Afghanistan. Its a situation in a downward spiral the draft report says and the deterioration is accelerated by rampant corruption and the heroin trade which is now about half of Afghanistan's economy. The government "has lost all trust" according to the British Ambassador Cowper-Coles report.

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Is Ahmadinejad or Khamanei Iran's socalled supreme leader, the leader foreign leaders should be paying attention to in the final analysis? The openings in the Clinton administration under Khatami for a reconciliation of differences, Irans legitimate interests and aspirations in the shiite and Islamic world and how they can be reconciled with the American interests as in Iraq. How rhetoric of Ahmadinejad may have poisoned these possibilities and clouded the real nature of Iran as not a totalitarian state says Akbar Ganji but more of a Sultanate in the Islamic tradition with a heterogenity of views and interests under an Islamic banner and authority, as for instance liberalism, socialism and feminism all views that exist as currents in Iranian society and vie to replace the existing Islamic ideology or to supplement or modify it in a form of modernizing element. And in the final analysis its about the hope of democracy activists in Iran and activists for modernizing element, and moderating influences in Iran's heterogenous society and in its bazaars that emphasize commercial instincts and manner over ideology, which also have popular support as they did under Khatami, to come up with a government that is more likely to work with a range of countries from China and India in Asia to Europe and the United States. And its about how the US and Europe can work towards that outcome requiring less rhetoric and more patience, firmness, and perseverence. ...

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Admiral Mullen chairma joint cheifs confirms most of what the British Ambassador in Afghanistan s saying about deteriorating prospects in the country. He understands the heroin growing issue brought up by US counter narcotics experts in the NYT recently, by saying "we've got to impact pretty significantly, pretty fast on the poppy issue". He is aware that poppy growing is abundant in the south and in Helmand province pours upwards of $100 million to finance the Taliban. General McKiernan who heads NATO forces there says that NATO forces would be authorized to attack narcotics bosses, their soldiers and infrastructure, if they are linked to movement of weapons, improvised explosives or foreign fighters in Afghanistan. Which is possibly a waiting mode till more troops are sent to Afghanistan as policing this rugged mountanous country with tribal regions and loyalties complicated by the narcotics layer and widespread corruption in the Karzai government and its loss of popular support requires many more troops than are now in the country and a sustained campaign. So far the US and European forces possibly outnumbered have resisted alienating the poppy farmers in the south through land based eradication. But with more troops Mullen's new approach and Petraeus's has to shift to something like that, at the same time as they follow Petraeus's new counterinsurgency doctrine in display in Iraq to draw down the Taliban strength to its core supporters by winning other tribal factions with no hardcore loyalties over to the American side....

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Tranlation of an oped article in French on the Lashkar -e Taiba terrorist group in Pakistan, and its links and sponsors in the Pakistan ISI agency which is itself a state within a state.

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India's response says Amitav Ghosh is better being like the Spanish response to the Madrid bombings 11-M as it is known in Spanish, than the American response to 9/11. The American response was military buildup and the invasion of Afgahnistan and then Iraq. The Spanish response was says Ghosh was of vigilance, patience and careful police work in coordination with neighboring countries. And in the case of India the added effort to eliminate the terrorists hideouts and safe houses in cooperatation with other countries. Tightened security in all areas and bringing it on par with the security in countries that have addressed the challenge at a much better level.