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France's Thomas Piketty concentrated on inequality and arrives at no solutions or relief, just a historical summary that is also intuitively seen. The pandemic, climate change's impact on agriculture and livable planet, the Ukraine war have raised three questions right before our eyes that are broader and cover more and deeper ground.  The pandemic showed that the dependence on manufacturing in remote locations was a serious error. Climate change showed that agriculture the ability to feed the world itself was affected by this dependence on remote location manufacturing.  Much of this manufacturing was shipped out to China, Europe and the US lost their manufacturing base and with the communities spread out  across the US and EU lost factories and work. Manufacturing was not just shipped out to China, the process was concentrated in a short span of time leading to destruction of the environment on an unprecedented scale in China and the world  by burning lots of coal and fossil fuels. The Russian invasion of Ukraine showed the failure of this arrangement  and exposed its cracks  for Europe, US, and the free world in Asia and Latin America. The shipping out of manufacturing in this way not only destroyed communities and jobs in manufacturing in the US and the EU, but also led to such a broad accumulation of  dollar reserves in Russia and China, that enabled the invasion of neighboring countries in Europe without serious consequences to their economies, the invasion of Ukraine and the threatened takeover of Taiwan. By tackling these issues and building a supply chain concentrated more at home and in the free world better manufacturing jobs will be created in Europe and the US and in the nations of the free world that mitigate and reduce all the effects of inequality that Piketty and others talk about. The newer factories built in advanced nations of the EU and the US and set up in the free world in Asia and other countries, will be built with climate change in mind and make the shift away from coal and fossil fuels, and for conservation plus efficiency in use of energy at every step in the newly built supply chain. The results will be good for all countries in the world including the US, EU, China and India, as climate change can be aggressively tackled in this way with the latest technology and trillions of dollar of capital investments for the benefit of all. ...

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Following the executive order by U.S. president Trump reversing Obama administration policies on climate change and clean energy, BBC correspondent points out that the strategy of the Trump administration and Republicans is to change the narrative to job creation and with court challenges let the Clean Power plan be delayed. This would be followed by a different plan with less regulation of the coal industry. The clean energy policies were unpopular in states where Republicans had support.

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Climate control groups estimate that about 75% of coal projects were cancelled following the Paris climate change agreement. 44 countries no longer have any coal projects. Remaining coal power plants are spread over 33 countries with half of these countries having no more than 1 coal project.

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The lengths airlines are going to reduce fuel costs including using 757' s on long haul routes and short haul planes on long transatlantic flights.

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The smaller containment design of the Mark 1 Nuclear Reactor used at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant in Japan makes it more prone to explosion and rupture from a buildup of hydrogen, according to some experts in the U.S. Nuclear Safety Program at the Union for Concerned Scientists. This design is smaller and cheaper to build but is less robust than other designs. In the U.S. there are 23 Mark 1 reactors at 16 locations, including the Oyster Creek plant in New Jersey, Dresden plant near Chicago, and Monticello plant near Minneapolis. Worldwide there are 32 such reactors in operation. The design was first developed in the 1960's by General Electric. Since then various modifications have been developed including venting systems to help reduce pressure in overheating situations.

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With China's automobile market declining for the fifth month in a row, and trade tensions rising, it now appears that carmakers such as Ford expanded too quickly in the Chinese market. Ford, Peugeot, and Hyundai appear to have poorly times their expansion in China, expanding at the tail end of the Chinese boom just ahead of the new Trump administration's efforts to challenge China's lopsided trade balance.  It has become so bad that this report shows workers at a Peugeot factory in China spending their days washing floors and attending Communist political study sessions at work. At a Ford plant workers shifts are reduced to a couple of days a month. Sales grew 3% in 2017 and declined 2% in the first 11 months of 2018, after increases of 14% in previous years taking the market to 28 million in a dizzying ride as it surpassed the U.S. sales of 17.5 million. Overcapacity is a problem in China with the aggressive expansion. There is capacity to make 43 million cars, but will produce 29 million in 2018, according to PwC, consulting firm. Ford meanwhile put in a new plant in Harbin in 2017, expanding its capacity to 1.6 million a year, but sales peaked at 1.27 million in 2016, and are down 6% in 2017, and 34% in 2018 to about 700,000. While there are no layoffs some workers are making only $220 monthly, forcing them to take second jobs as cab drivers or couriers. Suzuki decided to quit in 2018 exiting China entirely just so it would not pile up losses in what is now a market that is way overblown from the boom years. Electric vehicle production in the pipeline of about 7.5 million vehicles will compound this problem further with 32 new plants planned by 26 firms.   ...

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Russia reluctant to let in Chinese companies to build plants in the country because Russian manufacturers are concerned the Chinese will drive down prices and margins.

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A rapid increase in the number of Russians with favorable views of the US going up past 30% as one sign of the effort to improve US Russia relations by Trump and Putin is seen in March 2025. A call by Trump to Putin will take place March 18, 2025 to start discussions on how to settle the Ukraine conflict including land, power plants and exchanges and getting to the root cause of the war- NATO expansion. Some solutions include NATO being disbanded in its current form as archaic as there is no Soviet Union, its original goal being stopping Soviets from setting pro- Soviet governments, setup in Czechoslovakia and attempts to do this in Greece and Turkey. Truman formed NATO for this purpose in 1949 after the Berlin Blockade by Soviets. WIth nuclear arsenals being replenished in Russia and China, India, Japan, small nuclear states such as North Korea, Pakistan, the situation is different today with responsible policies needed today on this issue which are impeded by the idea of NATO on the borders of Russia and the Eastern European and British view of Russia as the pre-eminent threat not shared by India, Brazil, China and the new administration of DJT in the US. A long period of peaceful coexistence and arms control developed in the late 1960's, 1970's and 1980's between the US, German Federal Republic and Soviet Union/ GDR Germany. ...

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Mexico's domestic market is growing and compacts are about half of Mexico's 1.13 vehicle market. The San Luis Potosi plant will be able to make 160,000 compact cars a year, an investment of $650 million. Some of this could go to Mexico's own need for compacts in the domestic market. Also this could supply the U.S. market where GM needs compacts to compete with Japanese and Korean models. One of the reasons Mexico is able to compete with the Southern United States is is its high quality work force at a fraction of the cost. See the link to Mexico's turning out a large number of engineering graduates. When companies look at where to put a new plant, Mexico is starting to compete a lot more with Detroit, said Gabriel Renero, a consultant at Deloitte in Mexico City. They are finding a very attractive work force in this country. In the last year, American automakers have all introduced a variety of new models from their Mexican assembly plants. Being able to produce any kind of vehicle looks good in the global market, says Renero....

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The water situation on the Euphrates river. Three reporters for the NYT, Amir, Mohammed, and Abeer, join NYT's Campbell Robertson in talking to farmers along different stretches of theEuphrates river in Iraq, near Jubaish, Karbala and where it meets the Tigris. The causes of the problem are the water policies of TUrkey and Syria which are the upstrema countries and have built dams along the river which control its flow, a two year drought, and water mismanagement and neglect in Iraq. The river is significantly smaller now, and at this rate could be half of what it once was. It affects rice and wheat fields along the river which are turning into scorched dirt, canals becoming small streams, and water treatment plants sitting idle. The area for wheat and barley in the rainfed north is down 95%, and the date and citrus orchards in the east are dry. There are no treaties for water use with Turkey and Syria, so the situation is unpredictable. Recently Turkey doubled the waer flow into the Euphrates, a mover that increased water flow to ablut 60% to cover half the irrigation requirements for the rice growing season....

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Consumer buying habits at Walmart in the last 6 months since the sharp downturn in the economy hit in October 2008. Executives in merchandising at Walmart, Target and other stores discuss trends with the WSJ. There is adisciplined shopper with less browsing on the aisles. FOod is up on the list. Private label groceries at lower cost are selling well. At Walmart sales are up for refrigerated pizza,lower grades of meat. Ground beef and chicken sell way better than steak and beef. And carbohydrates are doing better than protein foods, so that pasta is doing well. Staying at home and entertaining at home is the trend says Fleming of Walmart, from the take and bake pizza at $5 to the movie and popcorn. Which is why the luggage section and trvel is slow, and flat screen tv's are selling well. Vitamins, herbs and plants for vegetable gardens are up as customers try to plant their own vegetable gardens. Car maintenance and repair is big, sales of motor oil, filters and tires. are some of Walmarts big sellers. Whatever makes the car last longer is considered attractive by customers. And home repair items are selling well at Home Depot....

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A significant part of the haze and air pollution in New Delhi, India, comes from crop burning in the neighboring Punjab and Haryana region. Here the Hindu newspaper looks at the practice that has not changed even after a 2015 government and NGT order banning the practice. This report cites data from the state of Punjab showing 65% of the 1.85 million farming families in the Punjab are small and marginal farmers. The problem is that the rice paddy harvest leaves 19.7 million tons of paddy straw in the fields and the farmers see burning this as a quick way to avoid incurring the cost of machinery and labor. The Punjab government is required to provide machinery to farmers for preventing the burning. Farmers say it has not provided this. Punjab government seeks funding from the central government in Delhi for meeting the cost. Till then marginal farmers continue their old ways creating a thick haze over New Delhi. Solutions proposed are having more biomass plants to generate energy and use the paddy straw, a Happy Seeder variety that takes works with the straw, and shifting to Basmati rice instead of the common rice crop. The way Indian democracy works political parties have remained wary of collectively working out solutions, letting the problem continue.  ...

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An around the clock tv network called Planet Green for Discovery Channel, an investment bet of $100 million that viewers with interest in global warming issues will support it.

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A $300 million retooling investment at Michigan Truck plant three years ago will make it possible for Ford to convert the plant to production of as many as 8 new models some from from Europe with a relatively small investment of $75 million. Michigan Truck Plant is in the midst of a 11 week shutdown because of unsold inventory of SUV's and trucks. Next spring Ford will move production of the Expedition and Lincoln Navigator to its Kentucky Truck Plant and then begin retooling the Michigan Truck Plant, with all of the plant's 1000 employees transferred next door to make Focus cars at the Wayne Assembly Plant where its adding a third shift in January. Truck and SUV plants in Kentucky and Mexico will probably undergo similiar makeovers at a cost of about $250 million each to rettol according to company estimates.

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The GM management does not get it , the GM spokesman does not get it, the workers don't get it, says Andrew Sorkin from what he hears them say. GM faces many problems, too many dealerships, too many models and brands, and union benefits and retiree benefits from another world of post 50's economic expansion, that can only be solved by a government sponsored bankruptcy or GSB. GSB is a necessary part of the solution as chapter 11 makes solutions possible without dealerships suing as state laws protect dealerships, unions striking and management insisting on the status quo. In all he sees the 35 plants of GM and Chrysler cut in half, only the Chevrolet , Cadillac and Buick and Jeep brands retained and Dodge Ram pickups merged with Chevrolet, in a GM-Chrysler merger. He cites Deutsche Bank's estimates that reducing the brands to the 3 mentioned for GM would reduce costs by $5 billion annually and reducing the dealerships by another $4 billion. Buick would be retained because its a huge seller in China. The government would setup a warranty insurance fund to insure the warranties of all GM and Chrysler vehicles bought while they are in Chapter 11. And some of the rescue money would go into retraining and helping promote new industry....