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Kristof reminds readers of the NYT that the more that the British acted to suppress the American insurgents, the more that fueled the insurgents fighting the British. After all the land they were on was theirs they felt and not Britain's. The same is true for the $0 million Pastuns on both sides of the border, the Afghan side and the Pakistan side. He says Americans are not sensitive enough to nationalism abroad. The war in Afghanistan is costing $60 billion ayear. Adding another 40,000 troops will cost $10 billion, enough to send 2 million disadvantaged children to a solid preschool, or could be as high as $40 billion extra, which over 10 years would pay for almost half of health care reform. Kristof doesn't see the 40,000 troops doing enough to change the picture much, except increasing support for Taliban as the American footprint grows as foreign occupiers. He mentions that standard counterinsurgency ratios of troops to civilians would require 650,000 troops including Afghans.

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Meet Victor Brown, one of the remaining 450 workers at Buick City, GM's sprawling plants in Flint, where in the 1980's 27,000 workers built GM cars. Victor Brown of Clio, Michigan, and O.C. Cooper do not want to leave, and have repeatedly turned down buyout offers from GM preferring to stay with GM even if it enters bankruptcy, and take their chances. Since 2006, GM has persuaded 60,000 of its hourly employees- about half of the total hourly workforce at GM in the USA- to take cash buyouts and leave. Cooper says, this is the only life he knows, he is 64, a machine operator at Flint North, a run down engine plant in Flint, Michigan. Every day for the 42 years he has worked here, he gets up, washes up, and drives to the plant. He can't imagine anything else. If he leaves he will give up $60,000, for apension half that amount, with no guarantee that its secure after a GM bankruptcy. Victor Brown is 55, a repairman with 36 years at GM, he is divorced and putting a son through college. A year ago he and others turned down a buyout offer for $62,500 to retire with all benefits, now this is down to $20,000, and a car voucher for $25,000. GM needs an additional 21,000 jobs to be cut and closing of 13 plants in its latest restructuring under help and supervision from the Obama administration. ...

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Air pollution concerns are leading China's National Development Reform Commission to set a higher goal for cleaner energy. The NDRC plans a 52 gigawatt increase in installed capacity for green energy in 2013, an increase from 36 gigawatts in 2012. This includes 10 gigawatts for solar energy. Clean energy will take up 57% of additions to installed capacity in 2013, compared to 35% in 2010, according to Tian Miao, an energy anayst at NSBO.

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An inherent division between the two sides about the merits of a large scale involvement- as advocated by a tactical military man McChrystal and the limited involvement advocated by Vice President Biden considering the lack of a reliable Afghan partner - have now spilled out into the open after a compromise was patched together about a year ago. That compromise involved sending more troops but with a deadline for withdrawal set for July 2011. Now as the war reaches a stalemate -as a war of this type in the mountainous terrain of Afghanistan, and as ordinary Afghans see no particular interest in either side in this war, was largely expected to turn out into- the frustration has spilled out into the open. General McChrystal, in an interview with Rolling Stone magazine this Spring, made comments with disdain for Vice President Biden, and an aide to McChrystal called National Security Advisor James Jones , a clown.

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The US gets the lowest score among the large industrialized nations- way behind Europe- in its record on greenhouse gas emissions and air pollution policies, agricultural policies, smog, and other environment criteria in a survey done jointly by researchers at Yale and Columbia Universities. On regional smog the US has a very poor score.

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Under new proposed changes carbon emissions permits would be sold to industry and heavier polluters would have to pay more. And to make it fair to European companies exporters in other countries like China would have to buy these carbon permits to be able to export to Europe. There is similiar discussion about this in the USA which expects caps on greenhouse gas emissions in a few years. These changes wouldn't go into effect till 2013 at the earliest and industry will be trying to create a level playing field by then. Countries like China and India because they are developing have been exempt from the greenhouse caps under the Kyoto Protocol which expire 2012. Under the Kyoto Protocol which Europe signed and the USA did not sign, European companies are giving carbon permits free to emit a certain amount of greenhouse gas every year, the heavier polluters have to buy the permits from the ones that pollute less creating an incentive for companies to reduce emisssions.

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One US military official says that there is very little respect and regard for each other between General McChrystal and Vice President Biden, going so far as to say that both men hate each other's guts. Personal strains, and the difficulties in Afghanistan compound the differences.

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Krugman comments on the Swiss National Bank's decision to give up the peg of 1.20 to the euro made in 2011, and reduce interest rates to a negative 0.75% on Jan. 14, 2015. He points to the dangers of complacency about the deflationary trend in Europe, Japan and the U.S., and deflationary pressures in China in the first quarter of 2015.

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About 15% of black men of working age in the population, and 21% of black women, were employed in the U.S. public sector, according to the population survey. The Labor Department reports 500,000 jobs in the public sector were lost since 2007. This reverses an historical trend of resilience in jobs for the public sector during economic downturns. If population increase since 2007 is figured in there are even fewer jobs considering more jobs might have been added, with estimates as high as 1.8 million. This is bad for black people in the U.S. because many work in public sector jobs driving school buses, in the post office, in the police and in other public services, with black people being 30% more likely than whites to hold a public sector job, and twice that of Hispanics. Thic comes at a time when the black community has seen a devastating impact from the foreclosures and other economic damage that followed the 2008 financial crisis. The result is shown in a study of foreclosures for 2005-2009 at Cornell University showing mostly black and Latino neighborhoods were affected by foreclosures at three times the rates for white neighborhoods. According to Pew Research Center the median white family had net assets of $142,000 compared to $11,000 for the median black family. With median black household income at 60% of that of white households the gap keeps increasing especially with high unemployment in black neighborhoods....

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Stevis and Steinhauser talk to ordinary Greeks as they face pharmacies running out of imported medicines and the prospect of returning to the drachma.

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Britain's Tax Service reports the number of taxpayers reporting incomes of 1 million pounds a year declined by over 60% in fiscal 2010-2011 from the prior year. In 2010 the Labor government of Gordon Brown introduced a 50% income tax rate for this income group, up from 40%. The number of million dollar incomes filed declined to 6000 from 16000 in 2009-2010, and revenues declined from 13.4 billion pounds or 9% of total taxes from taxpayers to 6.5 billion pounds or 4.4% or about half. The Labor government had hoped for additional 2.5 billion pounds in revenue, showig unintended consequences and surprises in economic policies.

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The US needs 100,000 jobs a month just to keep up with population growth. And 7.2 million jobs have been lost since December 2007. Where will the new jobs come from to replace lost jobs in retail, banking auto and other job losing sectors and when, and will some jobs never come back. Global Insight forecast show 8.1% unemployment in 2013, suggesting that jobs needed for population growth and some jobs from the pool of job losses will not be recovered for some years.

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Credit default swaps on the $70 billion in CDS on Greece for different parties were activated in March 2012, resulting in payouts of $3.2 billion. This editorial points out that this happened without causing any tremors. Jean Claude Trichet as president of the ECB insisted in 2010-2011 that a default in Greece would result in systemic risks caused by the swaps and derivatives issued and in the contagion effects. The result was a delay in cuttting Greece's debt to sustainable levels with a private bondholder haircut that would have come much earlier. The delay and the burden of correction falling on austerity measures alone means Greece's economy is in much worse shape and debt still is not sustainable with Greece's rapidly declining economy.