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By a vote of 3 to 2 the U.S. Federal Communications Commission voted to scrap Obama period rules on Net Neutrality. These rules banned broadband providers from blocking websites or charging for higher quality service or specific content. Ajit Pai the newly appointed chairman of the FCC joined 2 Republicans to scrap the protections. The internet will no longer be regulated like a utility.

Major telecom companies say they will not act in a way that will change the experiences of people online. Critics say they will challenge the decision in the courts. There is heated discussion on this issue and the meeting at the FCC was carried out with high security.

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"No amount of misrepresentation or statistical contortion can conceal or blur or smear that record. Neither the attacks of unscrupulous enemies nor the exaggerations of over-zealous friends will serve to mislead the American people." FDR said this  on October 31, 1936, it could also be president Biden.The current Media and Hollywood efforts to choose presidential candidates of their choice runs contrary to "We the People," contrary to views of ordinary Americans, of voters, workers and families. President Kennedy was told he should not take the nomination because he was too young. Kennedys' response was that it was he not Humphrey that went to state after state and won the votes in the primaries, no one else made the effort to run in the primaries in each state. President Biden has the support of 14 million in the primaries. George Chidi from Atlanta reports that undecided voters number about 1 million in the swing states and most are much older than the average. Most may feel insulted by talk about age when they are in the same category.  A 102 years old Lockheed engineer in Atlanta suburbs says he is a Republican but will not vote for Trump. There is also the women's vote in Georgia and Atlanta suburbs with abortion ban as the issue as it was in Kentucky and Kansas. How many vote will also be a factor, making energizing the base a key factor. The idea that one party is doing better than the other is refuted clearly by some of the people in Georgia shown here, and the age factor does not get the prominence the Media have given it, as long as the government is functioning well. Media has failed to look at the policy details of each candidate in a colossal failure that calls for alternatives. Older voters who are the major part of the 1 million or so voters in swing states that are undecided also say that the fact is that with both the candidates- as it is with administrations that are led by young presidents seen as too young to lead (JFK) the opposite of today- many of the decisions are made with an experienced group of advisers around the president. Many if not all also realize that the vast experience of an older president is also an asset. Much of Biden's legislation for chips science, infrastructure, the Inflation Reduction Act have not happened in Germany, France or the UK, and would not have happened in the US without the ability of president Biden to get the bipartisan support from being the one with the most experience in Congress in a long time. The result is the hundreds of thousands of jobs created each month and a growing economy, inflation down from 9 to 3% as the first step to further cost of living action to support ordinary workers and families. Only LBJ comes close and he signed landmark legislation for Medicare and Medicaid, and for civil rights into law 60 years back. By removing America from the wars that Reagan and Bush started and Obama and Trump failed to end president Biden has given the US an opportunity to inspire and lead the free world in a way that has not happened in many decades and build a growing economy, a bright future for the Nation. ...

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The 2016 Republican platform is written to express the ideas in the Republican Party for family values, child rearing using the Bible and traditional values, calling pornography a "public health crisis."  The Family Research Council and tradition or family focussed groups played an important role in writing it, with Mr. Trump playing less of a role. Instead of "physical barrier" with Mexico, it says "a wall"  should be built in a taking up Trump's idea, but in general it is a clear expressing of traditional family values that Republicans have supported for years and expressed frustration with the movement of social lives in an opposite direction. The same sex marraige decision by the Supreme Court and transgender debate were not present in 2012 election, so in that sense the Republicans see the country as moving in a different direction. More of the pendulum having swung too far in another direction is how Republicans perceive it, and their response is to go back to how things used to be and the world they knew, based on what they see as positive outcomes for the whole of society. Hence language that encourages teaching of the Bible in public schools, condemning pornography as a menace particularly for children, and insisting on "man made laws being consistent with God given natural rights." A good understanding of the Bible is considered "indispensable for the development of an educated citizenry."   Amendments opposing gay and transgender are being added. ...

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The earlier interactions between US and Iran have turned into an Iranian effort to develop its nuclear capabilities bringing the situation faced today, and showing the failure to find solutions of everything tried before and not helping the people of the Arab World and the Gulf regions.During the Reagan period American involvement under Defense Secretary Rumsfeld to support the Iraqi invasion of Iran in a balancing act. And just a year earlier the Democrat Carter's efforts to look at the Islamic revolution as a response to the CIA's intervention in Iran's internal affairs under Eisenhower's Foreign minister Dulles to secure oil supplies, and efforts to find a way to good relations with Iran. This was followed by the Democrat Obama negotiating with Iran, normalizing relations and Democrat Biden handing over Iranian assets  of hundreds of billions of dollars that were used DJT says to build its military that had suffered badly under the earlier western sanctions under Republican Trump.  It has led to some of the migration from Syria after Russian involvement that flooded Germany with millions of migrants and destabilized European countries democratic processes.  ...

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Jim Tankersley of the Washington Post looks at the myths and realities of trade following incorrect statements made by Donald Trump about international trade. For example Trump suggests that Japanese automobiles imports are a big problem, though the imports have been cut by over 50% since the 1980's with Japanese companies Toyota and Honda making cars in the U.S. in Kentucky and Ohio. Detroit faces competition from foreign manufacturers based in southern states, including Alabama for Mercedes Benz and Tennessee for Nissan. Mismanagement including lagging in fuel efficiency and quality, and higher health costs for older workers were problems facing Detroit in the past decade. The Obama administration provided support to the auto companies to make the recovery following two bankruptcies in the U.S. auto industry, showing the U.S. has intervened as needed and the auto companies have made transformational changes. A big problem says Trump is the trade agreement with China which he promises to renegotiate. Tankersley points out that no such treaty exists. The U.S. agreed to China's entry into the WTO. This is not something the U.S. can renegotiate as the WTO sets rules for trade for all countries. The likely result of a shift away from Chinese imports would be more imports from countries such as India and Vietnam which are lower cost producers than China. Trump says some of the 2 million jobs lost in the past 2 decades will come back, yet the shift may be towards lower cost countries from China, with fewer jobs coming back to the U.S. High tariffs would not lead to the growth Trump predicts. A study made by Moody's Analytics at the request of the WP shows a Trump move for high tariffs would lead to a recession and lead to mass layoffs as other countries imposed their own tariffs, leading to large loss in U.S. exports. Trump has made claims such as telling the Post that $19 trillion in federal debt could be paid off in 8 years without raising taxes by fixing trade. No grounding on facts is provided by Trump. One of the failures of the media in the 2016 election campaign is the failure of the media to provide scrutiny for candidates claims and wild exaggerations, which have gone uncontested or unquestioned, or without the persistence till satisfactory answers are given by the candidates making them. Especially when the stakes are so high, for the U.S. and for the global economy. ...

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The WSJ's Monica Langley provides insights into Donald Trump's campaign strategies, some of them right out of his book "The Art of the Deal." His target voter is from a think big strategy to get voters across a broad spectrum using the slogan "Make America Great Again," with a knack of tapping into a deep well of voter frustration with the political establishment. How to get attention in the media is the next step Trump tackled by using social media to the fullest - using Twitter often, making statements that attract attention such as the ones on China, Mexico, Senator McCain and Muslims that tap into failure of political correctness to address voter frustration on trade and jobs, immigration and terrorism. The Trump campaign has 14 million followers on Twitter, and 50 million "engagement" accounts on Facebook- that cost very little. Social media is to Trump in 2016 what community networking on the PC dashboard was to Obama in 2008. As the WSJ pointed out in an editorial, the splitting of the Republican vote among many candidates, and the failure of candidates to grasp the nature of the unconventional campaign waged by Trump- descending into attacks based on target groups of voters on every candidate except Trump- created the opportunity Trump has grasped with his knack for improvising along the way. Commonsense campaigning without sophisticated strategies, improvising often along the way, using the available medium of social media at little cost to get the message and slogan across, helped Trump make the deal with voters to upset the political establishment. The Sanders campaign is also based on careful repetition of the same slogan and facts about inequality and lobbyists, over and over again, offering strong action on health care and college tution just as Trump offers strong action on China trade, immigration with the idea of the wall, and barring entry of Muslims for terrorism till "we figure out what's happening." The difference being that Trump thinks big and targets the entire electorate of his party's voters in the primaries from the beginning, and a broad based campaign on many issues. Underestimating your opponent carries many risks in politics, never more so than when you are out of touch or not listening to voter frustration, and fail to speak up to it....

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Republicans have supported less regulation. After the 2009 financial crisis with faulty mortgages and excessive leveraging one would expect that there would be a shift among Republicans favoring necessary regulation of banks. This did not happen after the Obama administration failed to articulate a new culture after 2009 and lost control of Congress in 2010 by as much as 64 seats in the House 6 in the Senate, and in all demographic and income groups. The result was that the 2009 crisis changed some laws but not the culture of laissez faire that less regulation was better for the economy. It is left to president Biden to tackle this problem of culture and the Silicon Valley Bank clearly shows that the parts of the Republican and Democratic parties that support less regulation even where the regulation is essential for a good economy for workers and families, are self serving. No where is this culture of laissez fairre in its other manifestation in not planning for the US manufacturing base to be strengthened by government action more evident than in the way it has prevailed to turn a blind eye to not just sending manufacturing overseas, but over concentrating it in one country China with additional supply base from Japan into China. This is the challenge that the country faces- only if the culture or mindset changes will laws have the needed impact.  This report in the NYT shows that when president Trump appointed Randall Quarles to vice chair of banking supervision in 2017, Congressmen both Republicans and Democrats believed that less supervision was better for the economy. Democrats such as Congressmen Barney Frank were themselves part of the new culture when Frank joined Signature Bank's board in 2015, one of the banks that along with SVB bank caused the banking crisis of 2023. Its association with risky crypto assets is considered by the WSJ as being one reason the government decided to close it. Frank did not see this aspect of its risk insisting that the bank was in sound condition.  This culture is also manifested in its approach to the cost of living crisis and support for workers and families. The Biden administration sees the problem of culture and of clearly making the changes that create a new culture, and a new understanding of what is right for America, for its economy and for its role in the world, and best for its people.   ...

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See the adjoining report in DW.com that covers the planned meeting between Japanese PM Kishida and Kim of North Korea to reduce tensions in the region. Kishida is taking a proactive approach as the ideological positions have failed and talking directly to North Korea as Junichiro Koizumi had done in 2004 (with a visit to Pyongyang when Kim's father was president) is now the right course. It is now twenty years that this was not tried. Former president Trump met Kim of North Korea at the Demilitarized Zone DMZ near Seoul in 2019. Not much changed after that meeting. North Korea has increased missile testing with ICBM missiles and increased its nuclear missiles with improvement in technology since then. One aspect of the Reagan/Weinberger era policy was its sense that America would keep investing in defense and at some point everyone else would fall behind. This has not happened. After a slowdown in its economy in the early 1990's opportunities to build Russia relations were left to business interests and opportunities were lost. The memory of that period of Russia's economic collapse lingers and feeds a sense that somehow Russia was diminsished by waht happened after the abrupt collapse of the Russian position in Eastern Europe.  In fact the only nuclear missile tests conducted in this 21st century were conducted by North Korea.  ...

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NYT's Landon Thomas gives this exceptional report on how Deutsche Bank changed from a lender to the German auto industry and safe banking practices to enter the derivatives business and other opaque financial products that led to taking on huge risks. Deutsche Bank has agreed on Dec. 22, 2016 to settle with the U.S. Justice Department paying a fine of $7.2 billion for practices relating to faulty mortgage securities. This report says the problems started in 1995 with Deutsche Bank's leadership hiring Edson Mitchell of Merrill Lynch to promote the investment banking business at Deutsche Bank. Mitchell hired two derivatives traders Broeksmit and Anshu Jain. Mr. Mitchell died in plane crash in 2000 when he was 47 years age, Mr. Broeksmit committed suicide in 2014, 58 years in age, Mr. Anshu Jain, 53 years old, is the only surviving person of the three. Under Mr. Jain Deutsche Bank assumed more and more risk, and was involved in complex and opaque financial products leading to the toxic mortgage crisis, and manipulation of the lending rate for London banks.  It also lent $300 million to Donald Trump's businesses. Most of the profits generated from this venture have evaporated, with analysts estimating $15 billion in fines and penalties owed of the $20 billion that these ventures generated. Not counting the serious damage to the bank's reputation in Germany and the U.S. This report points out the role played by the CEO from 2002 to 2012 of Deutsche Bank, Josef Ackermann, in encouraging these ventures converting the bank from its original loan as a contintental lender to business to a bank selling opaque financial products for most of its profits. Landon Thomas also describes the events and days leading up to the suicide by Broeksmit, including a visit to a psychiatrist and Broeksmit's facing enormous stress about the investigations underway in Germany and the U.S. looking into the opaque financial products and practices of Deutsche Bank. This is also a cautionary tale about what happened in banking from the late 1990's leading to the collapse in 2008, leading to the problems of today- the need to rescue the economy in 2008-2009 and the low rate world that ensued damaging the savings of ordinary people, the infrastructure that was never built, the parallel crisis of the hollowing out in manufacturing as a false prosperity boomed in banking and finance. In a sense it is also a story of everyday lives that were damaged in the high flying boardrooms of finance in New York, London and Frankfurt. The revolving door between regulators and the banks made it harder to monitor and control banking risk letting this story unfold over decades, damaging the credibility of governments and the established political parties without clear alternatives from outside; as the dominance of Wall Street executives in the new outsider Trump administration shows.  ...

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This NYT report by Thrush, Shear and Sullivan, looks at retired Marine general John Kelly, the head of Homeland Security till he was made the new chief of staff at the White House. He replaces Vince Priebus, who was the Republican National Party chairman during the 2016 election, becoming the new White House chief of Staff in January 2017. Priebus lasted only 6 months. This report points out that presidential family members Kushner and Ivanka Trump now report to Kelly, as part of the new discipline imposed by Kelly in an effort to reverse the chaotic situation in the White House with different quarreling factions. Kelly made this a condition for his taking the position, which Trump accepted as he was keen on firing Vince Priebus and had asked Kelly to take the job since May. Kelly is shown here as monitoring the contacts of Cabinet secretaries with the president. Who sees the president and for how long is now determined by Kelly to impose rigorous discipline. Kelly supported McMaster in the dismissal of a National Security Council member supported by Bannon and Kushner, in an effort to bring discipline. There is one area Kelly does not get into- the tweeting and personal affairs of the president. His job as he sees it is to put some bureaucratic competence around the president. In doing this he takes a tough approach that so far is respected by president Trump, as the presidency suffered from repeated setbacks from infighting and leaks. Will Kelly last where others have failed is a question posed in this report. Two people who were superiors of Kelly give their opinions. Kelly reported to Leon Panetta, a former chief of staff under Bill Clinton who was Defense Secretary, and to Robert Gates,  a Republican who was Defense Secretary. Panetta may know him closely as Kelly was his chief military aide as Defense Secretary. Panetta says of Kelly, that Kelly never minced words, said what he thought looking at you in the eye- if he thought a proposal was nuts he would say it right out. The big question Panetta says is whether president Trump will give him the authority for long. Also stated in this report is that Kelly called Comey when he was fired as FBI Director, and that Kelly even considered resigning in protest.  Less noticed even in this report is the way in which a team of experienced politicians and the senior most officials in defense and national security are working together in August 2017. In an interview with Washington Post editor Ignatius broadcast on PBS, Republican Senator Corker described how he works closely with them, and how the key people in defense and national security work together before they see the president. The appointment of Kelly helps to create a core independent group of advisors around the president, which is positive in the event the U.S. has to respond to a crisis. ...

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John Lyons of the WSJ writes in this report from Seoul, South Korea, that president Moon may have inadvertently contributed to the sense of the futility of talking to South Korea about missile defense when he opposed the installation of the Thaad, Terminal high altitude missile system, in his election campaign. This led to the U.S. and the South Korean government of president Ms. Park moving ahead with the system before Moon was elected. Moon is a human rights lawyer who favored improved relations with North Korea. Domestic South Korean politics were decided by younger voters alienated by the existing business structure, leading to the conviction of president Park and later the head of Samsung on corruption charges, and the election of Mr. Moon. In foreign affairs the picture is quite different as Moon is seen in South Korea as not being consulted by the U.S. as it frames policy for the region. South Koreans call this "Korea passing." As U.S. and Japan are directly affected by North Korean missile tests, the most recent on August 29th passing over Japan, U.S. president Trump consults with Japanese prime minister Shinzo Abe. People in Japan are cited in the NYT as saying recently, that they knew they had to worry about earthquakes, but had not expected to have to worry about missiles. A recent report in NYT showed that most people in Seoul have not prepared seriously to use underground shelters because they do not believe a war could take place with Seoul only 35 miles from the North Korea border. The U.S. policy is now focused on working with China, and coordinating its policy with Japan. A U.S. anti ballistic missile test was conducted from the ship USS John Paul Jones on August 29th. Moon has changed his position and now supports Thaad missile defense. South Koreans are apparently resigned to the prospect of "Korea passing." ...

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WSJ reporter Monica Langley provides a glimpse behind the scenes of how Donald Trump comes up with his attacks on rivals, and statements on immigration, terrorism, refugees. Trump pays close attention to what is riling voters on any particular week, but other rival politicians are not willing to say. He looks for what resonates with the public, and in today's environment where politicians are cautious, careful and plodding, this strategy works. Donald usually puts down a few points on his private plane, looks at reports from campaign staff, yet makes all the decisions himself on what and how to say it. His memory helps, he says. And he has a flair for words, sounding uncouth at times, but yet choosing words carefully enough to sound reasoanble to his audience. In Jan 2016 this approach has worked for Trump in the Iowa and New Hampshire primaries, stalling progress by rival Ted Cruz, and holding back other rivals. Yet this approach has its risks as the primary season progresses. One of the changes in the Republican party politics in 2016 is the emergence of two candidates Donald Trump representing the white working class, and Ted Cruz representing evangelicals, who are both strident and willing to take strong positions on issues in striking contrast to leading Democrats. Trump on China, immigration, refugees, and Cruz on taxes, cultural issues for evangelicals, IRS, Affordable Health Care Act, and both candidates on terrorism. ...

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A new WSJ/NBC poll shows Trump and Clinton with high disapproval ratings with all registered voters. Clinton's and Trump's disapproval ratings are higher now after increasing negative coverage in the media. Trump has a 65 percent negative rating and Clinton a 56 percent negative rating with all registered voters. Among Republican voters Cruz has a gap of 15 percentage points between him and Trump for negative ratings- Cruz at 27 percent and Trump at a high of 42 percent. In positive ratings Cruz edges out Trump by 3 percentage points 45 percent to 42 percent. Among all registered voters Cruz has nearly 50% negative rating compared to Clinton's at 56 percent, and 26% viewing him positively only 6 points behind Hillary Clinton at 32 percent. These new figures suggest Cruz would be competitive with Clinton if Clinton were to get the nomination, and Cruz were to win at the second ballot following an improving result at the primaries including California because of Trump's huge gap in negative ratings with Republican voters compared to Cruz. The 1912 election provides a glimpse of how national party conventions were determined by shifting support- Clark the Democratic candidate with the most delegates was not nominated when the Tammany Hall machine supported Clark leading to the withdrawal of support from William Jennings Bryan of the liberal wing of the Democratic party. The nomination then went to Woodrow Wilson, the next leading candidate, on the 46th ballot....

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Fact check looks at the facts and what candidates claimed happened. Jeb Bush is right says fact check about the casinos Trump tried to get started in Florida. Fiorina overstates what she accomplished at H-P. Kasich is largely right about fixing the finances in Ohio. Trump is wrong about the U.S. being the only country with birthright citizenship- there are 30 countries according to The Center for Immigration Studies. Trump throws the number out of $200 billion, as what it is costing the U.S. for illegal immigrants. An estimate by The Federation for American Immigration Reform put this at $113 billion a year in welfare programs. From this one has to deduct what illegal immigrants pay in payroll taxes to get a good estimate. Trump says he never went bankrupt, he means not him personally- his companies have filed for bankruptcy Chapter 11 protection. Considering how many times Trump has misstated, it would be useful if the network broadcasting the debate would have an independent company do the fact check at the same time as the misstatements are thrown around, and show this on the bottom of the screen or during the advertising breaks, because it is very important to viewers to get the right information. In our opinionated partisan environment it is important to let candidates know that they cannot get away with it by misstating facts, over and over again....

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Retired Gen. James Thurman, the head of U.S. forces in South Korea 2011-2013 is cited frequently in this report by NYT's Gordon and Schmitt. Gen. Thurman says a calmer approach is needed now that the tensions have escalated with the heated rhetoric between Trump and the Korean government. He says the danger is in a serious miscalculation on both sides. Knowing the conditions on the ground in South Korea Gen. Thurman offers some advice considering that the U.S. faces large casualties in any conflict on the Korean peninsula. Seoul is only 45 minutes from the border. About 250,000 American forces are stationed in the region, allies would face serious damage in a conflict. 

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Dan Balz, chief correspondent of The Washington Post, says the stakes have hugely escalated in the 2016 presidential election with the rhetoric on immigrants and Muslims entering the U.S. following terrorist attacks in France and California offered by Donald Trump. He cites experts who point out that establishment voices are being ignored as a section of the American public supports Trump's opinions. An earlier article in the Post points out that about 30% of Republicans in a PPP poll support Trump's views, and 21% unsure. Other polls show American who are older, working class and not college educated support Trump in large numbers, compared to the support from college educated and higher income people who support Sanders on the Democratic side and who oppose American intervention in the Middle East- both Trump and Sanders supporters preferring to focus on problems at home than involvement in overseas entanglements.

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Why the Straits of Hormuz are a critical path in the seas near Iran and Saudi Arabia through which much of the world's oil supplies flow. With the U.S. gaining oil sufficiency the straits of Hormuz oil supply lanes in the seas are critical to countries such as China, Japan and India which lack enough internal supplies of oil. Japan's prime minister mediated between the U.S. and Iran to keep the oil supplies lanes open and free of the conflicts and rivalry that have taken place in the region. After initially saying Iran was responsible for some tankers that caught fire, president Trump reversed himself saying that it was unintentional. The U.S. maintains oil sanctions on Iran but is careful not to worsen tensions further, and Iran suffering from the sanctions pursues a policy of trying to wait out the U.S. sanctions.

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Thomas Friedman of the NYT points out the three aces held by Donald Trump in the U.S. election campaign of 2016. He could move to the centre in a campaign against Hillary Clinton and voters could give him a pass saying he only meant to start a conversation on immigration with his comment on the wall, that his comments on Muslims read carefully only means he would tighten controls on some countries, that he was acting in the way he said in his book "The Art of the Deal." A terrorist attack could change the atmosphere in the election and benefit Trump. And he could set a barrage of ads against Hillary bringing anti-Hillary Republicans back to his side after the divisions in a Republican convention. On the opposite side of this is Trump's penchant for making wild statements that could lead to a break with his support base, especially women who are shifting away according to some recent polls in mid March. Another vulnerability says Friedman is the rough way in which minorities are treated at Trump rallies, which could backfire with a serious incident resulting in hugely negative media coverage....

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US president Biden feels the tax system is not fair for most Americans and the Trump tax cuts favored the wealthiest Americans. Detailed studies from universities Chicago, Harvard, Princeton and Treasury Department on 2017 Trump tax cuts lowering taxes for corporations from 35% to 21% for top corporate tax rate, and accelerated investment spending deductions, show much of the investment that took place after tax cuts in 2017 would have taken place anyway. And that the tax cut did not pay for itself, adding $100 billion to the national debt of $34 trillion each year. Striking was the point in the studies that said that instead of $4000 the average American only benefitted by $750 per year, most of the benefits going to the wealthiest and corporations. Many of the largest corporations tech and oil companies pay less in taxes than any notion of fairness would call for sometimes much less than ordinary workers.  Biden now proposes the tax increases for corporations to go up to 28%, higher taxes on foreign profits, and the corporate minimum tax increased from 15% to 21%. And for employees paid more than $1 million corporations not to be able to take deductions. ...

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The U.S. commander in Europe, Lt. Gen. Ben Hodges, says Russia respects strength, and the U.S. must add capability in this situation where Russia is no longer a partner with the U.S. and Europe as it appeared to be previously. He sees the U.S. as ready to meet all its commitments and protecting democracy. He also says Twitter is not the best way to communicate policy as president Trump does, and that he receives his instructions through the chain of command.

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U.S. Supreme Court nominee BrettKavanaugh, a Court of Appeals judge in the District of Columbia, could affect the Mueller investigation and issues of pardon, because of his expansive views of the presidency. He was part of the Kenneth Starr investigation of president Clinton. During that investigation he pursued it vigorously but later his opinion was that the president should be not distracted from his important duties, and should have some freedom from being prosecuted. For this reason it is not clear how he would act in the Mueller investigation. President Trump could have considered this when he selected Kavanaugh, says this report.

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Krugman in the NYT reminds readers Charity Watch gave the Clinton Foundation an "A" rating, better than that given to the American Red Cross. He points out the disservice done by all the innuendo about conflicts of interest. The Associated Press report on the Clinton Foundation he finds part of this creating "shadows"  about meetings with corporate people or others with conflict of interest when all it could find was a meeting with Mohammed Yunus, a winner of Nobel Peace Prize and a longtime personal friend. This points to the need to take a good hard look at each candidate, to look carefully at the details and think about what it means for the country for the next 4 years or the next decade. Krugman fails to mention the economy and job gains and losses, yet this is a huge factor in an election year where upward mobility and the prospects for the middle and working class are major issues. For example Moody's has calculated the loss of about 3 million jobs under Trump and a gain of 10 million jobs under Clinton for the next 4 years.  ...