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Kenzaburo Oe in his writings reflected the anti-nuclear Japan of post World War II. That period also saw the emergence of China as a major economy. China's activity in the South China Sea, North Korea's ballistic missile program, created the situation where Japanese Defense Forces are now seen very differently as part of the US, India, Australia Quad alliance to ensure peace in the Asia-Pacific region.

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Marie Le Pen's National Front Party gets only 8 seats in France's parliament following the second round of voting. It will not have enough seats to form its own parliamentary group. After winning about one third of the votes in the presidential election Marie Le Pen will not have enough seats in parliament to act as opposition leader. Marie Le Pen will represent the industrial constituency of Henin-Beaumont in northern France. Many voters from the parties on the right and the left decided not to vote in the parliamentary elections giving smaller representation to all parties, with a sharp drop for the Socialist and Republican parties. The big gainer in this situation was the En Marche party of  president Macron. For the first time younger members were elected with average age around 40-ish and 38% of parliamentary seats going to women, which is seen as a positive factor in the results. By giving Macron a solid majority in parliament the French people chose to give the government the ability to implement its program for reviving the economy, and reducing the gap between rural areas, industrial towns and large metropolitan areas such as Paris, Lyon, Bordeaux.   ...

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Some ideas on how to reopen the economy in Britain in phases starting with release of some activities in May, followed by mid-June, and early July. Medical precautions and new protocol for being out on the streets, in public transport and in offices would have to be observed.

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  Tennis player Roger Federer's speech at Dartmouth College is useful advice - "its only one point" when you lose it, how to move on to the next one free of thought no negative energy, “When you lose every second point, on average, you learn not to dwell on every shot. You teach yourself to think, ‘OK, I double-faulted. It’s only a point.’ When you’re playing a point, it has to be the most important thing in the world, and it is. But when it’s behind you, it’s behind you. This mindset is really crucial, because it frees you to fully commit to the next point and the next point after that, with intensity, clarity and focus.” And how often does this happen? Every second point almost. Because he says he won at Wimbledon and US Open with only 54% of the points. He lost about half of the points and still made it, and this message is real life, it matters to most of us. When we focus, when we concentrate on the task at hand it is one minute at a time.  Mikaela Shiffrin is the ultimate example of concentration skill going downhill fast between poles requires utmost concentration and she did this for the US in the Olympics after many disappointments in previous Olympics, none of it mattered to her, as she practices and focused. And that takes one to Federer's next point it wasn't effortless. It was repeated practice, it was girt with practice that made a difference. Only today this was evident as Sanju Samson talked about talking with Sachin Tendulkar last night before today's World Cup cricket game Final with New Zealand in which he hit 89 runs and the third time he has done it in the last 2 weeks, in Ahmedabad's Modi Stadium, to become the Player of the Match, watched by nearly 1 billion fans around the world. And Federer's last message is to do this by having some fun, enjoying the experience, learning something new, exploring, and getting to one's potential. ...

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GE will spin off GE Capital into a separate business and put up about 20% of the assets for an IPO in 2014. GE will also get out of the retail lending business. The unit may also be put up for sale at a later date. This move is designed to meet shareholder interest in separating the industrial assets with steady earnings from the volatile financial business. GE Capital is the fifth largest bank in terms of its size and still generates a large part of profits for GE. Profits in 2012 for GE Capital were $7.4 billion. Other moves would reduce exposure to consumer lending and increase lending to midsized businesses. These are remaining moves following the 2008 financial crisis, in which GE Capital hurt GE's overall performance badly, for GE to return to its industrial business roots.

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Marion Rouse, Director of the Women's Tour de France is interviewed by FR24. The Women's cycling event is from July 24 to July 31. Here she talks about the resumption of this event after it stopped in 1989 and what it will mean to a new generation of young women cyclists. These girls on the side of the road cheering will now have women as role models, says Rouse who remembers herself as a little cyclist at age six years.

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After the loss of a crucial UK byelection by Labour under Keir Starmer (May 2021 Hartlepool) Shabana Mahmood says she brought out her inner-Kashmiri and steadied the party with wins in other byelections over the Tories. Shabana is the daughter of a teenager from Kashmir who came to Britain in the sixties, studied to be an engineer and settled in Birmingham. She is the Shadow Secretary of Justice and as a Oxford trained barrister she wants to put Britain's justice system on a good footing by remaking prisons and making the system work.  Shabana is a special kind of person simply because she has kept her values and religious beliefs and still taken the best of British thought and culture and the scieintific mind even as Britain faces real challenges. One is struck by the sheer broadness of her mind-  “I don’t like anything that smells of fundamentalism in any way, religious or political or ideological, it doesn’t really matter what it is, in the end. “It’s quite authoritarian in nature, and in my own life experience of people that are most intransigent and the most prescriptive about what everyone else can say and think and do tend not to be the best of people themselves.” ...

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The state of India's fight against Tuberculosis is shown here by AID's Atul Gawande in NYT. He visits a homeless shelter in New Delhi and asks what can be done to prevent the number one infectious disease in India and globally. The disease affects 1 in 38000 in the US and 1 in 500 in India a huge contrast as poverty and poor health conditions increase spread of TB. It grows with depleted immune systems and poor food intake. This alone shows how important it was and continues to be that prime minister Modi put forward no cost (free) allocation of foodgrains, lentils and vegetables during the pandemic to hundreds of millions of needy households. This and Clean India campaign Swacch Bharat + Har Ghar Jal Clean Water Every Household  play a critical role in providing the basic environment for health in India at the ground level for nutrition+ clean water, and sanitation. India has allocated $1.7 billion for TB prevention and treatment. 4-5 TB vaccines are in test stages.  Nearly 90 percent of estimated TB cases are now being diagnosed with treatment success rates high, says Gawande. Prevention is also at a similar level.   ...

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The chairman of the Economic Advisory Council to the Indian prime minister, says India will grow at an accelerated pace after the worst effects of the pandemic are over by 2021. The changes introduced by the prime minister in the economy should make a big difference in growth. Compared to the growth with centralization in India Acts of 1919 and 1935 when there were concerns about holding avast country together, future growth will be based on decentralization, says Bibek Debroy, who is also a member of Niti Aayog.

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U.S. Health and Human Services Department officials say one has to be "appropriately paranoid" about protecting the vaccine from theft in transit and at distribution centers. Very tight GPS tracking and even dummy trucks are planned. Hospitals vary in their approach to safety with some practicing normal security lockups and some treating the vaccine as they would a controlled substance with multiple checks before release. 

Brazil and Mexico followed by Peru and Argentina have experienced the most pharmaceutical theft incidents. The U.S. is also in the top five countries for pharmaceutical theft. U.S. marshals will accompany shipments of vaccines. Five large hospital systems in the U.S say the challenge is still keeping the vaccine refrigerated at extremely low temperatures and getting people vaccinated than theft.

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GE exits it consumer financial services operation that issues store credit cards for 55 million Americans in 2013.

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Gerald Seib in the WSJ gives 3 reasons for reluctance of president Trump to get involved in wars in the region on behalf of the Saudis- the U.S. is less dependent on Saudi oil with its increased oil production, China, South Korea and Japan depend on Saudi oil making it necessary for these countries to pay for the conflicts not the U.S. Other reasons are the U.S and Mr. Trump's opposition to endless wars that lead to neglecting U.S. priorities such as infrastructure and building its economy.  If the wars cost trillions of dollars the U.S. expects the Saudis or Asian countries to pay the U.S. for the cost of these wars. Japan is the most dependent on Saudi oil and it is playing a constructive role to reduce tensions between Iran and the U.S. Mr. Macron of France is playing a role because the EUropean Union also imports oil and wants to prevent the Iran nuclear deal from being ditched or at least for it to be renegotiated.

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BBC News on the Los Angeles protests as Immigration enforcement takes place against illegal immigrants in the US. ICE enforcement took place with arrests resulting in protests in Paramount a town 20 miles south of Los Angeles which is 82% Hispanic. Much of the protest activity took place in the city of Los Angeles itself near the Federal Building resulting in the president calling in the California National Guard.

 

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Slavery was banned by the 19th century in Britain and its Empire, it took the US till 1861 to do this and till 1961 to end racial segregation. By contrast Britain followed a policy in China throughout the nineteenth century that brought enormous pain and suffering to the Chinese people through the Opium wars and opening up of ports for opium trade in China. And the US under presidents Wilson, Coolidge, Franklin Roosevelt, and the American people followed a policy of respect for the Chinese people during this period with the idea fervently America believed of a modern nation emerging from the chaotic period of Manchu monarchy's decline by 1900 and warlords civil war + Japanese invasion from 1900-1945. For Britain and the European colonizers Chinese and Indian people were for the most part "coolies." Joe Stilwell, FDR's Supreme Commander of American Forces in China was the ultimate free of racism. A order from the Republican Coolidge administration in the 1920's was for any American soldier to be courtmartialed for so much as laying a hand on a Chinese coolie. A modern nation did emerge as the American people hoped and fought for in China, and in India over the 25 year period in the 21st century, with Britain having failed to bring the same level of understanding that America had for the Asian people.  Britain's monarch Charles tells Commonwealth leaders his government is not paying reparations for slavery yet is determined to create anew understanding to work with other nations in the future, to discuss issues with openness and respect. There are 56 nations in the British led Commonwealth, the largest of which is India. It includes South Africa, Kenya, Tanzania in East Africa and Nigeria, Ghana in West Africa.    ...

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Using knowledge of molecular crystal formation with a degree in industrial chemistry, and a chocolate making apprenticeship in Antwerp, this is what brings Thierry Muret to the exciting work of making new truffles. He originally wanted to become a scientist inventing new things. Today he uses his science degree every single day, as its all about crystals, says Muret, who is the main chef at a large chocolate maker, Godiva. His view is that chefs are all the time decomposing food and recomposing it as they see fit using creative ways and ideas. He says chocolate is a very difficult material, and it takes sometimes as long as 12 months to get one product right. One deals with temperatures and time and half a degree Fahrenheit is what the fluctuation allowed is. Here he describes a typical day at a chocolate maker and days when he gets creative, passionate about a creation, putting everything aside. Other days at a satellite kitchen in New York, or in Brussels talking about new chocolates for Christmas 2020. ...

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The chaotic nature of the national lockdown announcement in Britain with Health Secretary Hancock pushing for a national lockdown and prime minister Boris Johnson's hesitation for 2 weeks. The Chief Medical Officer Mr. Chris Whitty told a top level meeting of ministers that the NHS could be overwhelmed by the first week of December and warned of 4000 deaths a day, if a lockdown did not take place. Tory backbenchers continued to resist but the prime minister had no other option but to call for the lockdown. The fact that Germany and France decided on a national lockdown gives Boris Johnson the cover he needed in his own party.

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See the video of Trump Mamdani meeting November 20 2025, on the White House site. The US president says  "I don't care for affilitations or parties, we are going to be helping him." DJT says it is all about the good of New Yorkers, if we disagree on some things he will try to convince me or I will try to convince him." DJT says he had a very good meeting with Mamdani and found much more agreement on many things than he had ever expected. Again and again in the response to questions from the press Mamdani and DJT showed a collegiality that astounded the press and is likely to astound most people. Again and again DJT and Mamdani came back to the central issue for New Yorkers living in the 5 boroughs- the cost of living. DJT said he and Mamdani are together on this issue of affordability in New York. DJT described himself as a New Yorker, New York as a great city with great potential , that he himself aspired to be Mayor of New York, and he wants Mamdani to do well spectacularly well for the people of New York. This is a good sign for New York and the Nation. That a Democratic Socialist and a Republican business person can find common ground in the interests of the people and the Nation they love. ...

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China's total public debt was 95% of GDP in 2022, Japan's was 62% in 1991. It's population aging faster than Japan's with population declining in 2022, Japan's declining in 2008 twenty years after its bubble burst. China's per capita income at $12,850 in 2022, compared to Japan's at $29,000 in 1991. China is facing more difficult headwinds than Japan in many ways. There is also higher tension in trade relations with US and EU limiting export growth. There is also the policy stance of the Communist Party that sees rural areas left behind with about 35% people in rural areas and Xi is slowing growth to reduce disparities and housing construction led speculative growth. In Japan urbanization was 77% in 1991, compared to 65% in China today.