LyrArc Article Gist
51.4 million Americans used campsites of national parks and other parks in 2022. 

LyrArc Article Gist
The increasing use of chemicals in daily living and of sites contaminated from chemicals pose dangers to our health. This report in The Guardian describes the role of TCE or trichloroethylene acting as a carcinogenic agent and its tole in contributing or aggravating to Parkinson's disease. Dry cleaning, carpet cleaning and other household products such as shoe polishes are some of the products and uses that create exposure to this chemical. This report says New York in 2021 and Minnesota in 2020 have followed the European Union in banning this chemical. Other states lag behind and this report says Santa Clara County, California has 23 Superfund sites that contain hazardous chemicals.

LyrArc Article Gist
PM Modi's Jal Jeevan mission In India for clean tap water for 1.4 billion people even in the Himalayan regions can be seen in the context of water scarcity across the developing world in Asia, Africa, and Latin America, with 1 in 2 persons facing water scarcity. And there is further the problem of contaminated water. It shows that it is possible if there is the will to do it and the resources dedicated to do it. Not only is it harmful and reduces health with diseases it considerably undermines women and girls in society. This is shown in ads for Jal Jeevan mission with a mother and her daughter on Indian television with the daughter telling her mother that PM Modi and the government have brought tap water to the village and it need not be carried long distances from wells, the mom incredulous till she realizes it is true and hugs her daughter. It may be the most memorable of television public service ads on Indian  television in a long long time and shows the immense changes in the world's most populous region even overcoming the challenges of the pandemic. ...

LyrArc Article Gist
Horowitz provides a rare portrait of Donald Trump's father, Fred Trump. This is  useful in understanding Donald Trump because as Trump says frequently many of the traits- self-promotion, aggressive business promotion, taking advantage of political connections to advance the family business, penny pinching for construction sites- are all traits he inherited from his father. His father did not want to go to Manhattan as business was already nice and easy in Brooklyn and other places. The son went into Manhattan and put his name on Towers he built in the city. Fred Trump benefitted from the FHA and depression era programs setup under the New Deal by FDR, and the flow of immigrants and returning veterans, the zoning allowances given by politicians. Without this the business would be nowhere as successful as it was. Making it self-made only upto a point, in the intensity and the individualism displayed. Fred Trump was born in 1905 to German immigrants who spoke mostly German at home. His brother John was into books, and went on to teach at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, so the family was certainly aspirational immigrant. Fred was the doer and started his business with his mother at the age of 21, and by 28 had won the mortgage services business of a failing German bank, by 1938 at 33 he had setup property developments in Brooklyn. Federal Housing programs were the key- homeownership was emphasized in the New Deal with F.H.A. 25 year mortgage loans- as affordability was an issue in the Depression era period. Fred Trump keenly used these loan subsidies with price tags so it would be a stretch to say the business simply went up on the intensity and the business skills.  ...

LyrArc Article Gist
Berkshire new CEO Greg Abel 2026, Berkshire 2026 stock positions- Apple $60 billion American Express $55 billion Bank of America $25 billion, Coca Cola $25 billion, Chevron $20 billion, Chubb $10 billion. In addition GEICO wholly owned by Berkshire generates about $42 billion yearly in cash from premiums which can be used to invest in companies. By pursuing an affluent demographic American Express gets operating profit margins of 16% and return on equity of about 30%.  Apple has about 27% in net profit margin and 151% in return on equity in 2025. Because of the high affluence demographic of these two companies it offers a strong base for performance for Berkshire. The insurance company GEICO and its reinsurance operations offer a steady stream of cash. This  is the base on which Berkshire has done well over the last two decades. The efficient markets hypothesis moderate form for investors says that publicy available information is reflected in stock prices to a great extent except for anomalies and behavioural aspects. When investors use a basket of 1000 stocks reflecting the economy as Vanguard core index funds, the anomalies and behavioural aspects are less prevalent or cancel each other out creating a strong form of the efficient markets hypothesis in practice for investing discipline. Benjamin Graham, the mentor for all investment leaders would accept this as a way of securing investment gains without the vagaries and uncertainty in selecting stock positions. In 2025 the Berkshire funds achieved 10% gains vs the S&P 500 index which gained 17%, proof that the average investor can do just as well as the so called sage of Omaha, Warren Buffett. ...

LyrArc Article Gist
Claire Cain Miller is a Pulitzer Prize winner for public service. Here she writes about the results of the Pew Survey on Parenting. It shows that many of today's parents feel they had emotional needs which were not met and are trying harder to do this for their children, to show love and build relationships with their children. In open ended responses they say want to check in on the emotions of their children to see how they are.  About one third of mothers say parenting is a lot harder than expected. parents today worry about the mental health of their children, about anxiety and depression. Mothers also found competing pull from work and careers which made it a lot harder. During Covid many mothers simply focused on the children and gave up work to do this. Economic anxieties are also present for today's parents who see the financial independence of their children and finding careers they enjoy as more important than starting families of their own. ...

LyrArc Article Gist
Prodigous AI investment is crowding out essential investments in US infrastructure in factories, schools, roads, rail, bridges, airports, ports, and energy for homes/manufacturing in 2025 that are needed badly to make the US competitive with other advanced industrial nations.

LyrArc Article Gist
How does one ensure social justice and fairness in a society, US society, where two thirds of kids in the 4th grade can't read with proficiency? A section of society is handicapped for life when it can't read and is excluded from its benefits and discourse. This weakens democracy. It also means the quality of manpower in manufacturing and other essential occupations suffers, putting the country at a disadvantage in competition with other nations.

LyrArc Article Gist
Growth in China is supporting growth in other Asian countries. But other Asian countries are still dependent on the economies of Europe and the USA. About 60% of the exports to China by Malaysia, say Malaysian officials, are components for products that are re-exported to the western countries. Domestic demand in China is insufficient to support the high level of growth in China and other Asian countries; in the event demand in Europe and N. America slides back in the face of austerity cuts in 2011, growth across Asia is likely to fall sharply.

LyrArc Article Gist
Somini Sengupta and Brian Frank provide this award winning quality of coverage in text and pictures of life in California's San Joaquin Valley, hit by wildfires and scorching heat in the middle of the pandemic. Shown are workers in the fields of one of America's largest agricultural regions fighting heat and the pandemic, struggling to survive on a precarious hourly wage in these conditions. During earlier periods from 1970 this was an almost picturebook place particularly in the cool and foggy winters, which stretched for miles with apricot, grape, almond and other fruit and vegetable fields. A dry valley using irrigation of fields with water from the surrounding Sierra Nevada mountains. Most affected are millions of workers of Hispanic origin originally from Mexico, who provide most of the labor for harvesting of crops. California with a good educational system and without the drought that hit the region, without the effects of Silicon Valley splitting the people of the state in opposite directions most on minimum wage with a concentration of wealth around major cities and spiralling property values, was a very different place in the 1960's and 1970's from what it is today. Increasing wealth concentrated in pockets and not spread out as it was in the early post war period after Truman and Eisenhower has impoverished large areas and segments of the population, creating what Dickens called in his day- "it was the best of times, it was the worst of times," depending on who and where you were. ...

LyrArc Article Gist
Issues surrounding child labor in India and other parts of the world covered in The Hindu.

LyrArc Article Gist
Better cycling infrastructure, well defined cycle paths away from other traffic, well lit paths, helps women get safer transportation and improves fitness. Infrastructure for cycling is especially important for women says Kate Jelly in The Guardian. A 2019 SusTrans bike life survey shows only 6% of British women bike regularly compared to 21% of women. The figure for women cycling regularly is 55% in Netherlands and in Copenhagen. It is much higher than UK for women in Paris and Lisbon after new cycling infrastructure has been placed in the two cities.

Similar issues exist in other cities around the world, in India and other countries where cycling was once a major form of transportation but has dwindled with the emergence of other forms of motor bikes and heavy traffic in cities, and the lack of cycling infrastructure.

LyrArc Article Gist
By ending liberal asylum rules the Biden administration can end the issue of surges in illegal migrants crossing the border with Mexico that has roiled politics in America for the last decade. Much of the surge in migrants is a result of economic dislocation in Central American countries that only be tackled in other ways not at the border. This is a lesson that was learned in Europe, and is being learned in the US. 

For the US and EU this detracts from other major issues that the countries face in the way that wars in remote regions dissipated resources of the US and EU. By creating issues that have no real relevance to America's future development and ways in which that development benefits other countries in the world, these wars and border issues are now errors from the past.

LyrArc Article Gist
The U.S. Australia, China, India, Canada Britain, Sweden and other countries in Europe have growing trade and other tensions with China. Gradually a new situation is evolving for world trade as each country looks at its own interests in the trading relationship with China.

LyrArc Article Gist
Fact checking Apple CEO Tim Cook's statements on the EU Commission ruling for $13 billion in back taxes, shows that CEO Tim Cook's statement that "we never asked for, nor did we receive any special deals," is not true. Ireland let Apple determine what it would pay in tax, and Apple had the benefit of loopholes in Irish tax laws, the fact check by experts shows here. Apple's Cook also says it would hurt investment and jobs in Ireland. Another NYT article showed that the entire healthcare budget of Ireland would be covered by the $13 billion, and 66% of its budget for social support services to the public. Apple has 22,000 employees in Europe and 6000 in Ireland in 2016. Based on the $13 billion owed in taxes, for every job in Ireland the cost to Ireland is 2.17 million euros, and for every job in the EU the cost is 590,000 euros. Apple could turn around and locate in some other place, other than Ireland, in which case Ireland does not get the 6000 jobs. This is Ireland's incentive to give Apple tax benefits. Only if all EU countries had common tax laws would it be possible to avoid this situation, and generate much needed tax revenues at a time of cuts in public spending in healthcare, education, and social services, and invest in infrastructure, worker retraining. The alternative is for the EU to look at other remedies. This is what the EU Commissioner Vestager did when she announced that this was a state subsidy and illegal under EU rules. Because the appeal by Apple goes to the EU Courts the appeal is difficult say legal experts. The EU courts look at the legal aspects of the ruling, was it justified, not at the overall aspect of the ruling by Vestager, as EU Competition Commissioner. This may be why there is so much outcry from Apple, and other digital companies.  ...

LyrArc Article Gist
Dr. Anthony Fauci warns against anti-science, anti-vaccine feeling in the U.S. and other countries. 

LyrArc Article Gist
The relationship of former German chancellor Schroeder with Russian president Putin reflects personal experince with the deaths and destruction of the Second World War. Schroeder lost his father in the war. Putin is the only surviving child, born in 1952, of a mother who barely survived the siege of Leningrad from 1941 to 1944 when 641,000 Russians died of starvation in the city. His mother lost one child in the siege.

LyrArc Article Gist
Other European nations and the U.S. will be watching Germany's opening of small shops and small retail business under 800 square metres of space on April 20, followed by other business on May 4, in a gradual partial reopening of the economic activity

LyrArc Article Gist
Governor Yuko Koike has set 2050 as the date for Tokyo to achieve zero greenhouse gas emissions. The Tokyo Metropolitan Government has put out the plan in "Tokyo Zero Emissions Strategy." All vehicles will be using electricity or fuel cells. And all buildings will use solar and other forms of renewable energy. The govenor called on all Tokyo residents to fight climate change. Also planned is an effort to reduce use of plastic and other materials that consume large amounts of energy.

LyrArc Article Gist
PM Modi inaugurates 5G service in 13 cities in India. These cities are Mumbai, Ahmedabad, Gandhinagar, Pune, Delhi, Gurugram, Chandigarh, Jamnagar, Lucknow, Bengaluru, Chennai, Varanasi, and Kolkata. Other cities will be connected in the next few months and other parts of India in the next phase of 1 to 3 years. Jio's Akash Ambani and Mukesh Ambani took the leadership role in pioneering 4G in India. Jio is now playing a key role in pioneering the transformational technology of 5G throughout India.

LyrArc Article Gist
Even in a state that has the lowest diabetes rate in the US at 8.1% there are huge disparities in health and living. USA Today offers a look at these two Colorado's one of affluent Colorado residents who have access to trails, have the knowledge and resources for healthier lifestyles and the other around them who lack access to healthy food, and lack knowledge and education about healthy lifestyles, and face financial and other stress that aggravates their health conditions. 

LyrArc Article Gist
After the outbreaks in July Florida, the Carolinas, Arizona, and other states in the southern U.S. imposed some form of mask mandates either locally or at the state level. This combined with the restrictions on gatherings and reversal of opening of restaurants and bars, other places of gatherings, have helped slow the spread and reduce cases. Even though the cases are still high there is a levelling off in late August, says this report in the NYT, with graphs in color showing trends.

LyrArc Article Gist
Some of these retreats cost up to $20,000. Yet a retreat for a fraction of that maybe $3000-$4000 can be put together by taking advantage of the organic and other food now widely available in Europe and the US and India, and making room for reflection, meditation, mindfulness, sleep and connection during self-made retreats. Some of the locations can be as an alternative in Colorado or the French and Austrian Alps or Kulu Valley, other parts of the Himalayas.

LyrArc Article Gist
Walks in Paris, Rio de Janeiro, Sydney, Seoul, and other cities to explore different parts of the city.

LyrArc Article Gist
Football Interview: Eder Sarabia and Setien -Elche Football Club in Communidad Valenciana, a small club, eighth in La Liga, with a Bilbao born coach. A story of resilience, being honest and a good person, playing football the right way. Eder calls it "jatorra," from a Basque word. His career ended at age 24, following his mother's advice he studied engineering. He developed another career by coaching youngsters in Basque country feeder clubs. Followed Setien to Las Palmas, Real Betis, and to Barcelona for a year, and was made coach at Elche in Communidad Valenciana.