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The Wisconsin Republican primary turns out to be the turning point for the Cruz campaign. Following his landslide win in Utah, Cruz wins in Wisconsin by about 14 percentage points, and begins the long journey to close a signficant part of the gap with Donald Trump. Cruz's organization, and the anti-Trump groups efforts, ad spending, helped Cruz in his win. Trump was handicapped by a series of gaffes including one on abortion- saying he would penalize women having abortions- alienating women. Cruz's margin for voters making up their mind on the day of voting, excluding early voting, was higher at about 17 percentage points. Closer media scrutiny of statements by Trump and policy implications, including foreign affairs, European policy, the nuclear issues, happened in the week before the Wisconsin primary. This happens late in the campaign. The weak media vetting of the main candidates Trump and Cruz being lost in the coverage of Trump's sensational statements and twitter comments about wives, for which the media has come under criticsim. ...

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O'Malley, Sanders and Clinton agree that the media has spent much too much time on the Hillary Clinton email controversy. The first Democratic party debate also puts Sanders on the defensive on issues such as using force as commander in chief, gun control, and foreign policy including a no fly zone over Syria. Clinton defended her positions as consistent and having the same values throughout her political career, on the Patriot Act which she supported, and on other issues such as the Keystone pipeline, and the Trans-Pacific Partnership which she opposes because it does not do enough to protect U.S. jobs. Clinton emphasized her flexibility by saying that- "But like most human beings, including those of us who run for office, I do absorb new information. I do look at what's happening in the world." The debate was a win for Hillary Clinton because it helps to put the email controversy behind her, puts the focus back on her story and work as Senator and Secretary of State, and showed her ability to take on the many questions about her credibility....

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Compromise reached at the October 2010 G-20 meeting in S. Korea to reduce trade imbalances, and for countries with current account surplus exceeding 4% of GDP (China 4.7% and Germany 6.1%) to bring these balances down by 2015. Countries with large current account deficits, Turkey 5.2% and South Africa 4.3%, were expected to bring their deficits down and increase national savings. The US is at 3.2%. The US proposal for a target was accepted by Japan as long as it was not a fixed target but a reference point. Germany was opposed, saying it was a return to planned economy thinking. China did not comment on the issue. Canada, Australia and the UK supported the US position. The compromise was an effort to continue pressure on China to redirect its policies away from exports to increasing domestic consumption, while still refraining from a fixed target. It also takes some of the pressure off a fast track currency rebalancing, with China expected to increase the value of the yuan, but given more flexibility than the rhetoric would suggest....

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The yen is at 134 to the dollar in June 2022 having dropped by 22% in 2022. The US Fed is increasing rates while the Bank of Japan is keeping its low interest rate policy. Japan's inflation is at 2.5% compared to 8.6% in April 2022 for the US. The last time the central bank intervened to buy dollar was in 1998 with severe yen overvaluation which is not the case now. The yen's weakening means the parts Japan imports from its supply chain in Asia now cost much more.

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The US Federal Reserve, America's central bank, would rather see a recession than for inflation to get a hold in the US. Another way of saying this is that the Fed sees the American economy fundamentally strong under the Biden administration as it strengthens protections for workers and families, corrects flaws in policies for rural America and in other areas, moves to attract foreign investment and gets US companies to invest in America. This makes the danger of inflation greater than a recession, so that a policy of aggressive action with interest rates is justified.

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High levels of covid and RSV in the US are leading to health authorites saying wearing masks is needed to prevent it from spreading. Los Angles is likely to introduce a mask requirement for indoors by the end of December 2022. Carrying hand sanitizer and keeping wipes with you is a good idea because RSV spreads through touching infected surfaces. Vaccination for flu and covid is also a key prevention action. As most people are no longer wearing masks in the US the practice of wearing masks is becoming a good idea once again.

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This report in the NYT shows a grim reality that about 70% of 15400 nursing homes offering a place for the elderly in America are for profit and some owned by private investors who seek to turn a profit on the operations. With competition from home care support and assisted living facilities the investors were having a hard time turning a profit on the operations resulting in deterioration in quality of operations and care. 

 Japan, Scandinavian countries, and Germany, other countries have a better system for quality of life as people get older.

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With roads blocked and subways closed after the heaviest snowstorm in 50 years, Madrid healthcare workers walked long distances to work. Many healthcare workers, nurses, medical residents  walked 10 to 20 kilometres to get to work at hospitals.  In Spain the virus has claimed 51,000 lives and cases are at over 2 million. One nurse took 2 hours 28 minutes to walk to work, saying as he crossed fallen trees and 40 centimetres of snow that he decided if he got there it was ok and if he did not he would turn back.

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Biden's visit to Israel brings Israel and Mr. Netanyahu closer to a two state solution of the Israeli Palestinian problem. Mr. Biden and Mr. Blinken attend a meeting of the cabinet of the Unity government in Israel that includes the Opposition leader Yair Lapid. Once the shooting stops this opens the way for a comprehensive solution to the Israeli Palestinian problem with all sides, including all sides inside Israel. Mr. Netanyahu is seen as having lost authority, and the confidence of Israelis. this could bring Israel to the centre, says Steve Erlanger, chief diplomatic correspondent in Europe of NYT.

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Almost all countries have lower commissions for real estate sales. In the US about 3-4 houses are sold over a lifetime. At 6% commission this amounts to a cost of 25% of the sale price of these homes. This adds to the cost of living for American people and reduces their savings for investment in quality of food, education, health and leisure activities. By comparison in the UK it is 1.3%, in Netherlands 2%, in China 2.5%. In most countries only 33% of sales are done by buyer agents in the US 89%, in the UK less than 5%.

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Two women Claudia Sheinbaum of Morena party and Xochitl Galvez of National Action party are contesting the presidential election in Mexico in 2024. President Lopez Obrador is from the Morena party, he was former mayor of Mexico city and led the socialists to government in 2018 with his book presenting his message "Saying No to Corruption, Violence and Trump's Wall." He won by a landslide and during his term he targeted corrupt officials and worked with the US Trump administration, and now Biden administration on tackling migration and border issues.

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Studies in college in diverse disciplines gives a broader outlook and is useful for resilient careers. 1.4 million students were studied for 2009-2019 in the US showing that a wider funnel means broader opportunities. A diverse set of skills helps find more stable jobs. The most resilient were people who studied different disciplines say economics and biology. This kind of diverse knowledge also brings better capabilities to solve problems and find solutions in a creative way. This means companies with people having diverse skills will also do better in the long run.

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Benny Gantz puts forward a realistic plan for Gaza's future that is completely different from Netanyahu's, with provision for international responsibility with Palestinians to run Gaza and demilitarization of Gaza strip. He sets June 8 as the deadline. Gallant and Benny Gantz say Netanyahu's plan only has two outcomes that lead to endless conflict- Israeli control or Hamas control both having led to this disastrous situation for the people of Gaza and Israel and of Palestine.  This comes as US Defense Secretary Blinken plans visit to Israel.

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President Biden tells USA Today in an interview that "based on polling" he could have won when running for president, yet cannot say about being president at 85 years or 86 years, saying "who the hell knows."

"When Trump was running again for re-election, I really thought I had the best chance of beating him. But I also wasn't looking to be president when I was 85 years old, 86 years old," Biden said. "But I don't know. Who the hell knows?"

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For the first time we hear of "period poverty" in advanced European countries. Scotland charities say there is "period poverty" in Britain as the pandemic hurts incomes across Scotland. Women and girls not having money to buy sanitary products needed during menstruation. The Scottish parliament passes a Period Products Bill to ensure all women have free sanitary products, the legislation costing about 10 million pounds.

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One cannot imagine that this city is Hong Kong. It shows how the coronavirus is having some unexpected effects and interesting experiments. About 800,000 students are going through a 2 month school closure. The response is to setup a crash course in digital learning. Schools are sending lessons and assignments to students to online. Live video interactions are being conducted. Parents are involved in intensive home schooling efforts using digital learning.

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The campaign in German schools "Smart ohne phone" or "Smart without a phone"  for school children in 2025. One student at Dalton High School in Alsdorf, North Rhine Westphalia, Klara Ptak, is cited in this report by  Oliver Pieper in DW.com. Klara 17 years old says- "A total of 51 phones were seized — that's a fairly significant number considering we have 700 students. And you can really see a difference, especially in the younger kids. They used to stand around in a circle staring at their screens, and now they are playing football, badminton, or board games together. It's a dramatic shift." A survey by the Körber Foundation, and pollster Forsa, says that parents of children ages 12 to 18 complain that their children's time spent on social media is out of control and is their leading source of stress. The German National Academy of Sciences Leopoldina is for banning phones upto tenth grade, it wants to keep children under 13 away from the internet for social media completely. It is interesting to note that the younger student are fine with it and adapted quickly seeing the benefits. This shows that a new generation of student can be trained for a different lifestyle. Today in the Washington Post Linda McMahon and RFK Jr. team up on an article saying just this that time spent on screens lifestyles along with nutrition and food fail school children badly, reminding people about the saying in Latin since the 2nd Century by poet Juvenal -"a healthy mind in a healthy body." ( Latin -"mens sana in corpore sano").   ...

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U.S consumer spending declines by 0.9% in Dec. 2014 over the prior month, according to the Commerce Department. Consumer spending was up in Nov. 2014 by 0.4%. Excluding auto sales and falling gas prices the Dec. 2014 decline in consumer spending was 0.3%. This shows that consumers are saving most of the money saved as a result of gasoline at about $2 a gallon, or using it to pay off debt. Analysts had estimated a significant increase in retail spending which turned out not to be happening.

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One commentator in Norway says "an entire state apparatus has played bankrupt" with Norway's international reputation. British and Norwegian Royals Sarah Ferguson divorced wife of Prince Andrew,  Princess Mette-Marit of Norway, and the Epstein Files showing messages exchanged with Epstein even after much of his history was known, show a lack of judgement that reflects badly on Britain's establishment, on Norway's establishment. There are media reports of Mandelson, Starmer's UK ambassador to US of having sent messages to Epstein on matters relating to confidential plans of the government to sell state assets and about policy influence under a previous Labour administration.This suggests to people in Britain that Labour has failed to appoint people of integrity to important positions. Before Rutte of the Netherlands took over as head of NATO, the head of NATO Stoltenberg for 10 years was from Norway. The total population of Norway of 5.5 million is less than the population of the Houston region. Should it exercise such an important role in the affairs of Europe much less of the world? It was under Stoltenberg's appointment in 2014 as head of NATO after losing an election in Norway, with Merkel and Obama's support, that gradually changed the perception of NATO as too close to Russia's borders so that by 2019 when Covid took place the situation deteriorated in Europe beyond recognition. Russia and China joined together and Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022 with Stoltenberg in a role in NATO that reflected more the British view of NATO than how DJT and other Republican leaders perceived NATO. As America turns this chapter of Bush-Clinton-Bush-Obama years of failed politics in which US lost control in its own backyard to drug trafficking gangs in Mexico and Venezuela, conducted wars in remote deserts and mountains in the Middle East, and lost its economic position to China, turned over NATO to  politicians who followed a British view of hostility to Russia that did not reflect the American view of working in cooperation with Russia, China and other major powers, this appointment of Stoltenberg a figure in the Norway establishment may be seen as another failure of the Merkel/Obama years. ...

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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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Bihar unemployment and West Bengal unemployment of 3-5% a fake number as the jobs counted include unstable temporary poorly paid work. Quality Jobs are only 10% of the workforce. These figures disguise huge problems. In Bihar and West Bengal youth unemployment is high and many youth simply leave the state for states in the western part of the country such as Gujarat and Maharashtra looking for work. In West Bengal the situation is particularly dire as the state government has blocked foreign investment and it is not an investment friendly environment. In addition the idea of a cut or a fee for everything and services, encouraged by the state government, leads to an entrenched climate of corruption that keeps out investment in industry and in infrastructure. The lack of cooperation with the federal government at the West Bengal state level leads to people in the state not having access to federal programs for housing, healthcare and water, sanitation. None of this shown in the media. When the media inside India and in the US or EU covers India, it fails to even give this importance. Probably because of the huge ignorance about India, its history and struggle for industrialization and modernization for the last 50 years. It is similar to the huge ignorance in America and Europe and inside China itself during the years of Japanese occupation of China in the 1930's, and through the efforts for industrialization in the 1960's and 1980's. A BBC article on fish is an example of this shown alongside this article on Bihar (and West Bengal). Both states were part of British Bengal, which is where the British based their Empire after the British East India Company secured rights to the revenues of Bihar and West Bengal by the 1780's, that had been take earlier by the Moghuls during their invasions from Afghanistan and Iran. This was the beginning of the destruction of West Bengal's economic structures in the way it happened in China by the 1850's with the Treaty Ports secured by the same East India Company of the British merchant Navy. The process of unwinding of this enterprise goes on today even 75 years after 1950 against the roadblocks to industrialization and modernization in India set by native corrupt state administrations. ...

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US $1.5 trillion budget request for 2027 fiscal year by the president for military and defense spending is about 4.7% of US GDP forecast of $31.8 trillion in 2026. In 1960 it was 9% following the Korean War. It dropped to 3.1% of GDP by 2000 and stayed around 3.4% till the current effort to modernization of the US military is thought to require about 5% of GDP.  (World Bank charts). The US spent far higher during an earlier period reaching 14% of GDP in 1953 during the Cold War with the Soviet Union. This report shows WSJ Analysis of where the $1.5 trillion request for Defense is going-  $1.1 trillion for War Department and $350 billion for critical munitions. The munitions are in short supply and war in Iran shows that it plays a critical part in defensive systems such as intercepting of missiles as missiles in short supply affect overall capabilities. An additional $200 billion for Iran War. Pay raises for Defense personnel. $66 billion for shipbuilding- 34 ships to put the US back in the lead for shipbuilding it has lost to China, with the help of Japan which is also ramping up the shipbuilding it has lost to China. US and Japan were leading shipbuilders in the  1930's and in the 1960's, then lost it to South Korea and China. About a 12% decrease in other Department's budgets including Health and Human Services, Treasury, Commerce, Interior, Housing and Agriculture.  These cost reductions some of it coming from more efficient functioning and from concepts such as zero based budgeting where every line item in the budget gets reviewed every year for how much is needed for the purpose, is the purpose still valid, and can it be done more efficiently costing less. $660 billion is coming from the savings. The Nation's capital will also get a facelift, a major renovation, after being ignored for years. In the new Budget is $10 billion for the Presidential Capital Stewardship Program within the National Park Service for beautification projects in Washington D.C., which will give the National Capital a much needed new look for millions of visitors from the 51 states in the Union.    ...

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After segregation in housing and schools since the 1867 Lincoln Emancipation, particularly in the US Southern states, protests happened in the South led by Martin Luther King Jr. to change this. situation. Voting Rights Act 1965 signed by LBJ ensures right to vote for Black people in the South- it follows protests in Selma Alabama and LBJ's 1965 "We Shall Overcome" speech that followed Selma. The first Blacks elected to US Congress were from seats redrawn to give Andrew Young a seat in Atlanta, and Barbara Jordan one in Houston. In 1993 2 more seats were added. James Clyburn was given a seat in South Carolina- he was a key supporter for president Joe Biden. Others followed. Today in 2026 there are 62 Black Members of the US Congress. This is about 11.6% of the 435 seats in the House of Representatives and 100 seats in the Senate total of 535. As a percentage of the population Black people are 16.4%- or 56 million out of US population of 342 million. The Supreme Court is essentially saying it is time to pause this as enormous progress has been made 12% out of 16% already achieved in representation for black people in the US considering the other inequities in American society, the changes in culture and in technology, inequities in world trade and for rural America. In a 2013 5-4 decision Shelby vs Holder US Supreme Court  swing to this conclusion with Alito, Scalia and Thomas joined by Kennedy and Roberts. This already struck down the core of the Voting Rights Act as unconstituional. Roberts wirties in that decision- Our country has changed,” Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. wrote for the majority. “While any racial discrimination in voting is too much, Congress must ensure that the legislation it passes to remedy that problem speaks to current conditions.” Times have changed - in 2026 the Court reaffirms this. In Louisiana vs. Calais the Court voted 6-3, striking down the last aspects of the Voting Rights Act, because white voters in Louisiana objected to use of race to redraw districts. The equal protection clause of the 14th and 15th Amendment to the US Constitution prohibit using race to redraw political representation maps. ...

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U.S. president Trump announces withdrawal from the Paris climate change accords, saying the U.S. will consider re-entering the agreement  or coming up with a new deal. He said "I was elected to represent Pittsburgh, not Paris." Trump said he was concerned about the environment, and avoided saying climate change scientific evidence was not correct. He based his concerns on the idea that China and India were getting an unfair financial advantage over the U.S. The U.S. had pledged under the Paris accords to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 28% from 2005 levels by 2025. The WSJ's Stokols and Ballhaus point out that president Trump had the option because of the nonbinding agreements committing nations to a broader goal of reducing emissions to combat temperature change of of 3.6 degrees F, to have modified emissions targets and still remained in the Paris accords. For Trump the motivation may have rested more on politics to shore up support in the Republican party which has largely opposed climate change targets.  ...