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Pipes describes the failure of the opposition to offer constructive ideas and frame itself as an alternative to the AKP and prime minister Erdogan. Turkey's moves towards its historic role in the Middle East under the Ottoman Empire 1300-1923 championing Muslim interests, as opposed to the secular position taken by Ataturk and the modernizing of Turkey under post Ataturk governments.

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The trial of Turkey's military officers, politicians and journalists, for an attempted military coup in Turkey under the elected Erdogan government.

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See the piece by Paul Pillar because it says something at the heart of the problem- one of the biggest paradoxes in the rationale for the counterinsurgency. And it is this: the Pakistan government you are trying to help is assisting the forces that threaten it. At the heart of this paradox is the fact that the Pakistan government, military and intelligence services are not all acting together and there are clandestine and some open elements in each of these institutions that support the Taliban. And the official elelments also are hedging their bets and are willing to make adeal with the Taliban if necessary.

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  $112 billion out of $170 billion in new investments resulting from Biden's 2 climate laws, and the bulk of the 200,000 new jobs are being pushed by president Biden into Republican states. Republican voting states including many southern states are getting the largest share of the hundreds of billions of dollars in renewable energy investments by the Biden administration. Two new climate laws were passed by Biden without many Republican votes in 2022. WSJ offers a visual guide to where new manufacturing investment is taking place. It shows that three fourths of the $170 billion in investments by companies are going to Republican voting states. On a state wide basis this amounts to $112 billion for Republican states. Most of the public is unaware of the role of the climate laws in this new investment in manufacturing. This is why other presidents talked about manufacturing investment including previous presidents Republican and Democrat, president Biden has done the country a great service by making much needed investment in manufacturing and creating a new sense of hope in once neglected communities. Investments are being attracted to these states many in the south with easier land development and lower costs for labor, electricity, and lower taxes. This gives Republican states the ability to use their advantages in the best way and overcome the failure of many Republicans in Congress to support these investments with president Biden putting together bipartisan support.  ...

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The Congress party leads with 100 seats in Rajasthan and 114 seats in Madhya Pradesh in the State Assembly elections.

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Weidner gives 10 reasons to be wary about buying Facebook shares. The biggest may be that the value has peaked, especially when this is validated by the large number of private holders selling their shares including Goldman Sachs. The percentage of IPO shares that are being sold by private holders in the Facebook IPO is 57%, compared to 28% for Google. Clearly something is going on.

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BBC looks at France's mayoral elections and the race in Paris between Racida Dati (connected to Sarkozy) and Emmanuel Gregoire deputy to Anne Hidalgo Mayor of Paris. 930 miles of bicycle lanes in Paris have reduced pollution in Paris by 10 years, which helps Gregoire. Dati says Paris "is dirty and unsafe." She points to 10 billion euros in debt for Paris. Dati comes from the conservative side and is a protege of  former president Sarkozy of the Republicain party.

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The Baltic cables cut were first the cable linking Sweden and Lithuania. Following this the cable connecting Germany and Finland was cut. China's government was not involved, and China says it strongly supports maintaining the security of international submarine cables in accordance with international law. The Chinese ship was carrying Russian fertilizer and had visited Russian ports. Danish Navy ships then tracked the Chinese ship and made it anchor in the Kattegat Strait connecting the Baltic and North Sea. Damage to underwater cables happened in Swedish waters resulting in Sweden launching an investigation.

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Amanda Lacaze of Australian rare earths maker Lynas- what can be learned from her experience in rare earths? Lynas is a Australian mining company with a mine in an eroded volcano Mount Weld that has a concentration of rare earths metals. In 2014 it was faced with China's near monopoly of rare earths and price subsidies, lack of awareness in financial markets and the government about the importance of rare earths in manufacturing. It was a period under the Obama administration that after the Bush administration had little grasp of the importance of manufacturing in America and how its decline would affect communities across the Nation, economists trumpeted the virtue of free markets without grasping how China would wrestle control of manufacturing with state subsidies and aggressive pricing and of strategic new technologies.  This included rare earths where the monopoly was close to 100%- if it is 90% today it is because of companies like Lynas. Production processes at Lynas's plant in Malaysia were not sufficiently developed in 2014. When Amanda Lacaze (now 66 years and head of Australia's Minerals Agency) joined Lynas in 2014 the first problem aside from getting Japanese creditors to restructure loans because of aggressive pricing by Chinese firms was to improve manufacturing processes to get 95% quality instead of 48% quality (measured in number of quality rejected product). This was achieved in the first year. To do this she thinned her management ranks and closed offices in Sydney (to cut costs) and moved management to Malaysia where the problems in manufacturing processes would make or break the company. She was able to get creditor Japanese government backed Japan Australia Rare Earths financial institution to renew and extend loans. Had this not happened the company may not exist today. It shows the sheer foolishness that pervaded most of the American industry at that time, the failed economic theory that said America could not support its industry when rivals were supporting theirs, the Bush and Obama administrations that had no understanding of how the industrial competition was takin place in world trade that could substitute other nations for America' s dominance in manufacturing and did little to push back and regain the position for America in world trade. This ignorance continues in some sections of business today that cannot see the plain facts and refuses to see the enormous damage to the Nation from the destruction of its manufacturing base and loss of good jobs in communities across the US. Lynas is now getting contracts from the US government for rare earths and is the only reason China's dominance in rare earths in 90% and not 100% along with MP Materials of the US. Planning was discredited in the crazy euphoria that turned the fall of the Berlin Wall and the Communist Soviet Union, as economists never understood that planning that was used by the Soviets and Chinese in their Five Yer Plans is just borrowed from centuries of basic ways of conducting business that had originated with the Industrial Revolution in Britain. Without planning the growth of the British Navy and the industry that supported it Britain could never have gained the dominance that it did in the 19th century Industrial Revolution. As the Industrial Revolution spread in the US in the 19th and twentieth century every major company had a 1 year Operating plan and a Long Range Plan for 5 Years and 10 Years. The government would have identified rare earths with foresight as one of the newer technologies and the manufacturing infrastructure needed to support its development if these plans were developed at the different levels of government and at the highest levels. This was done under market economy in China. Instead DJT was forced to step back from trade negotiations with China for unfair trade when China held out with a threat to stop export of rare earths materials in 2025, because a huge hole or gap in planning happened at the highest levels of the US government. That happened 11 years after 2014 when Australian rare earths maker Lynas survival was in doubt under a new CEO Amanda Lacaze. This is only one of many misses in American manufacturing and industry, in world trade, that came from misguided economic theory and failure to grasp the basic facts behind the success of the Industrial Revolution in Europe and the US. ...

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Efforts to ramp up the actions on stopping illegal migration in the EU after the US president describes the shaky situation in Europe. EU ministers agree on centralized list of safe states to return migrants- Bangladesh, India, Egypt, Morocco and Tunisia. EU plans to downgrade trade ties with countries that do not cooperate. The idea of return hubs outside the EU are proposed by Denmark. Denmark is now working with UK to help the UK develop a Denmark style policy that cuts down illegal migration after the unrest in Britain over asylum hotels. Failure to act quickly and have a comprehensive approach that works to reduce illegal migrants across borders can lead to governments such as the UK being voted out for other parties with strong anti-immigration stance as the mood shifts in Europe.

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Figures from Kiel Institute for World Economy show that European Union aid to Ukraine is nearly double that of the US- $187 billion for EU to $98 billion for US aid. The American Enterprise Institute conservative think tank also confirms EU aid is significantly higher. Trump said US was $250 billion to European Union $100 billion- completely the reverse of the facts. This is one aspect of the debate with Harris that was not fact checked to reach the 67 million watching immediately similar to the FBI correction on crime rates by David Muir.   "Look, we’re in for $250 billion or more because they don’t ask Europe, which is a much bigger beneficiary to getting this thing done than we are. They’re in for $150 billion less because Biden and you don’t have the courage to ask Europe like I did with NATO. They paid billions and billions, hundreds of billions of dollars when I said either you pay up or we’re not going to protect you anymore. So that may be one of the reasons they don’t like me as much as they like weak people. But you take a look at what’s happening. We’re in for $250 to $275 billion. They’re into $100 to $150. They should be forced to equalize.”   ...

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The State of the Union Address in 2026 cited the enormous impact on the world we know today over 2 centuries by this Nation. Jefferson breathed his last in 1826, between that and two persons in the chamber- including Air Force pilot who is 100 years old- between 1826 and 1926 when this pilot was born is a span of 100 years, and in this pilot's lifespan another 100 years. In this period, a couple of generations in our lifetimes, so much was achieved, said the president. So much of the address was about the potential ahead following the heroic efforts of the past. We are part of something larger than us, says the president, and this larger than us is the collective consciousness of the American Nation. "Two-hundred fifty years is a long time in the life of a nation. But in another sense, it's really a mere moment in the eye of history. Two of the gentlemen we met in the gallery this evening took their first breaths one century ago. One hundred years before that, on July 4th, 1826, the author of the Declaration of Independence, brilliant Thomas Jefferson, drew his last breath. Just a single long human life span separates the giants who declared and won our independence from the heroes who stand among us tonight. Everything our nation has done, everything we have achieved, has been the work of those few great lifetimes. In those brief chapters, Americans built this nation from 13 humble colonies into the pinnacle of human civilization and human freedom. The strongest, wealthiest, most powerful, most successful nation in all of history. Americans ventured out across the daunting and dangerous continent. We carved pass through an unforgiving wilderness, settled a boundless frontier, and tamed the beautiful but very, very dangerous wild west. From empty marshes and wide-open plains, we raised up the world's greatest cities. Together we mastered the world's mightiest industries, shattered history's monstrous tyrannies. And we liberated millions from the chains of fascism, communism, oppression and terror." Washington, Jefferson, Lincoln, Teddy Roosevelt, FDR and JFK, through their efforts and the efforts of scientists and industrial pioneers, and of the People of the United States, of educators and scientific endeavors, so much was achieved, and so much lies ahead. ...

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Mexico's unemployment rate fell to 3.3% in June 2017, the lowest level since 2006, as the outlook for the Mexican economy improves. The problem for Mexico is that most of the new jobs created have low wages and wages have not kept up with inflation. Inflation is at 6.3%. Low labor skills means many people take jobs at low wages.