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The weakness of South Korean political parties and political institutions is apparent in the way Yoon handled the presidency and his opponents try to remove him from office. South Korea needs to mature as a democratic country with less divisive politics.

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“Getting gas from America is always a good thing.” Alaska's governor Dunleavy tells Japanese and South Korean, Taiwanese investors. Japanese PM Shigeru Ishiba says the LNG from Alaska is "wonderful for us." It takes just 7 days to get this LNG to South Korea or Japan.  Mike Dunleavy's plan, called Alaska LNG, is for a 800-mile pipeline from Prudhoe Bay that would feed gas to a to be built liquefied natural gas terminal at Nikiski near Anchorage. What was once just a hope as investors pulled out is now a reality with DJT telling Dunleavy, "lets get it done, let's not just talk about it." Note that something similar is likely to happen for car investments by Japanese and South Korean companies. Already Hyundia Kia has announced a $21 billion investment. For Alaska LNG pipeline South Korea has said this has "infinite possibilities for growth." US Navy is rebuilding for protecting the Asia-Pacific, Japan and South Korea know the importance of the actions of the new Republican administration for Asia-Pacific and the Indian Ocean region, and tariffs can be a time to invest more in American manufacturing and show restraint in pricing. ...

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Surjit Bhalla, executive director for India at the IMF, looks at different trajectories of growth in India to 2030 and 2047. He looks at growth for per capital incomes that India can achieve over the next 2 decades to meet the aspirations of a young population of over 1 billion. With next generation technologies and acceleration in growth after certain parameters are met including logistics capabilities, manufacturing in advanced technologies, infrastructure improvements, rule of law in some states, federal and state governments working together, much of the work to achieve per capita incomes similar to Japan and South Korea can be achieved in the next decade by 2035.

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Remote work and transfer to other locations from San Francisco area mean salary changes of 10-20% for tech workers in Silicon Valley. Most tech workers in companies such as Google are now working remotely. This is leading to companies making plans for a future work force with decentralized staffs in many less costly locations. This should also reduce the pressure on living costs and the quality of life in northern California cities. The cost of living in other cities in the U.S. is 10-25% lower than that in San Francisco, Seattle or New York. Tech companies are following a policy of setting the wage based on location and local costs for housing and other costs.

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US president DJT speaks at the Economic Club of Detroit, looking back at a year of rapid action on the US Border, Big Beautiful Bill, Tariffs action, Cutting Cost of Living action on several fronts, and action against drug/people trafficking by Venezuela, Mexico. Highlights of the speech which comes to a state that decided the 2016 election for DJT and which is the center of America's automobile industry started by Henry Ford in Dearborn, Michigan. He had restored the automobile industry to the days when it was the leader in the world and when names such as Henry Ford, Alfred Sloan of General Motors, were the envy of the world, by bringing auto manufacturing back from places like Mexico, Japan and Germany. Back to America after years of reckless outshoring by American business under the Bush, Clinton, Bush and Obama administrations, on the advice of equally reckless economists and advisors to these administrations. The president did not say this but this restoration continued in a different way for labor under the Biden administration that followed DJT policies but focused on the other side of the coin for the auto industry - protecting worker's wages by Biden standing on a picket line for the strike by unions for higher wages. After these wages were restored from years of outshoring and pressure on wages, the need to do the work of bringing companies back through tariffs on imports as leverage in tough negotiations with Japan, South Korea and Germany was left to DJT and his administration. The president stated clearly that the economists and predictions were proved wrong on tariffs as none of these predictions of tariffs passed on to American buyers have come true. As DJT made certain the companies not to lose their business in the US decided to avoid taking that road and acted to reduce their profit margins and costs. As Scott Bessent, a veteran of Wall Street and now Treasury Secretary who conducted these negotiations for DJT, has repeatedly pointed out the tariffs were a way to get these tough negotiators and their governments from Japan, S. Korea and Germany to cooperate. It is nowhere written in the code of fair conduct of nations that the US should helplessly after decades of letting these countries benefit put its workers out of work and its industries get destroyed, when the US was taking on the additional burden of protecting these nations from hostile neighbors. ...

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The lessons from Italy, the epicenter now of the coronavirus pandemic, are clear- act early and decisively, impose quarantines and lockdown quickly to prevent intermingling. These steps need to be put early, with absolute clarity, and strictly enforced. This report in the NYT shows how decisive action early is the only way to prevent the crisis from becoming a large one that threatens the health system and millions. German states such as Bavaria and others now have a $25,000 euro and some have jail time. Singapore has jail time and fines for violating the stay home quarantine orders which it imposes after contact tracing. Taiwan has similar measures. Enforcement and strict control are part of the tools that have worked in these places and in China, South Korea.  Britain has still to close flights from Iran, Italy, which The Times reports on March 20 are still landing at Heathrow. This is after the U.S. weeks earlier banned flights from China, Iran, Italy, and last week from Europe after EU nations failed to take action early.  ...

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Strategic siting in renewable rich areas (Dallas center the largest is in renewable rich area) and fair cost allocation to not burden small businesses and households are major issues in Data Center building. Data centers for AI -rows and rows of servers 5000 in hyperscale data centers- used 4% of the US total electricity use in 2024. This is growing rapidly. By 2030 this is expected to grow by more than double, by 133%. About 60% of this to power the servers and 30% for cooling the servers. About a third of these servers are located in Virginia, Texas and California. How will this affect Cost of Living concerns, affect electricity prices? Carnegie Mellon working with North Carolina State University did the modeling on the energy and emissions implications of data center buildup in the US in their Open Outlook Initiative. A 8% annual increase in electricity prices is expected on average and as high as 25% in Virginia by 2030.  Total of about 40% increase over 5 years. Between 2014 and 2024 10 year period average cost for a home electricity use went up 25% from $114 a month to $142. This would now go up by 40% to about $200 by 2030 in just 5 years significantly impacting cost of living in the US. In which states will it strain electricity grids? In 2023 data centers consumed 26% of the total electricity supply in Virginia. In North Dakota 15%, Nebraska 12%, Iowa 11%, Oregon 11% according to Electric Power Research Institute. What are the energy types used? Natural gas is used for 40% of the data center electricity, wind and solar 25%, nuclear 20% and coal 15%.   ...

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About 570,000 Asians live in the Washington D.C. area, making it the area with the largest concentration of Asian people in the East coast of the U.S.. Chinese in the District and Montgomery County, especially in Rockville and Potomac. Filipinos in Prince George and Charles counties. Indians in Loudoun and Fairfax counties. Koreans in Centreville. The 2010 census shows a 60% increase in the Asian population for the Washington D.C. area. Washington D.C. now compares with New York, Northern California, and Boston in the number of Asians living there. Indians are the fastest growing group among Asian-Americans. In Loudoun county, near the high tech corridor surrounding Dulles International airport, the Indian population has gone up from 400 in 1990, 2300 in 2000, up to 20,000 in the 2010 census. They also make up the biggest group of Asians in Virginia.

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China, Japan and South Korea routinely provide assistance to their companies and through this to the workforce.  Economists who lacked understanding of business stuck to an ideological idea that the capitalist system of Adam Smith was built on fair competition. What they did not understand was what was meant by fair and what capitalism prevailed since the beginning of the Industrial Revolution in the 1750's and Adam Smith's days. Much of the British business was based on its own version of fairness and trade which meant whatever worked for British domination of trade, the oceans, and markets. These economists missed this completely. Now the US shows it is able to do what Britain of Smith's days and Japan, China in the post 1950's and 1990's have done to dominate world trade and world shipping and logistics, and has the funds to provide assistance to American companies for world markets. $550 Billion from standard 10-15% tariffs charge for all nations to access US market as a fund to finance US Manufacturing.  ...

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Some companies have raised prices by 5% on footwear and clothing. Out of the total tariffs of about $50 billion in the first half, the Census department numbers show that about $22 billion is from machinery and electronic, about $12 billion from automobiles and about $12 billion from items such as clothing, footwear.  The major manufacturers in Japan, South Korea and Europe of automobiles and electronics, machinery, make up $34 billion out of the $50 billion in tariffs. To maintain US market access  these large companies are absorbing most of the tariffs. It is only in clothing and footwear making up $12 billion that some of the tariff related price increases will be seen.  Overall this impact could be 5% of $12 billion or $600 million. The DJT administration will find ways to offset this for American buyers in 2025-2026 similar to the deduction of auto lease interest costs in the One Big Act 2025 to cut automobile expenses, using the new $100 billion Customs revenue.  ...

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A finding that could create a health revolution in America- unhealthy snacks shift our appetite away from healthy foods. Families who shift away from processed or ultra processed foods and experiment with it for a month find that their cravings for these unhealthy snacks diminish, and they can eat healthy home cooked foods with gusto. Children who simply poked at the home cooked food are shown to relish eating home cooked meals after an experiment turning off ultraprocessed foods and snacks, foods that have unthinkingly crept into our nutrition and our food habits. We are simply setting up ourselves and our children for trouble ahead as these ultra processed foods deteriorate our nutritional fulfillment and cause diseases that would in the absence of ultraprocessed foods not happen. These diseases have become so commonplace today that we owe it to ourselves and our children to take corrective action. People save up for retirement over many years yet create no savings and bank deposits in the area of better nutrition and health, so that when they get older that bank account of nutrition and health is empty and running out. ...

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Asylum hotel protests and illegal migrants in Britain filing for asylum at 111,000 cases in first 6 months costing $5.4 billion in first half 2025 alone. The Times of London says Starmer is cautious by nature, but strong action is needed going back to the source of the problem that illegal migrants do not belong in any European nation including Britain. The stark truth says Cowley in the Times of London is that having a battalion of British infantry on the coastline of France as it was during the Paris Olympics in France, is needed to keep the boats out of Britain with Britain moving out of the European Convention of Human Rights. That convention was not intended for this situation, just as the British system of justice was not intended for this situation for the people of other countries on other continents illegally migrating over oceans. Just as much as there is no Asian Convention of Human Rights for Europeans migrating over oceans to China, Japan or South Korea now industrialized nations with high standards of living and social protections for health care. ...

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Washington Post Analysis and details of Census Bureau trade information in September 2025 -showing the country by country and product tariffs by US and which tariffs are waiting for final trade agreements. China, India and Switzerland, Mexico face high tariffs. UK, EU, South Korea, Japan have made trade agreements with the US, China, India Swiss are still to finalize trade agreements leading to the uncertainty. The North American Trade Agreement is being renegotiated leading to uncertainty for Mexico and Canada which have both benefitted from trade with the US to detriment of US manufacturers.  China has huge surpluses that keep growing over time to $1 trillion ($992 billion) a year in 2024.  DJT Tariffs are designed as a bold step to remake the international trading system so that it does not work to the benefit of other nations gaming the system over decades as US administrations Clinton, Bush, Obama, paid no attention. Trade Deficits and the National Debt are a problem not just the National Debt. On the National Debt Republicans have pushed through cuts in parts of the budget where costs had escalated tremendously. ...

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Phillipe Pons in Le Monde on social media and disinformation popular with young people who have fewer employment prospects in the middle of sluggish economic growth.  Japan's Ministry of Education erasing Japan's wartime atrocities in school books in the years LDP in power since 1950's. Sanae Takaichi's comment about Japan willing to intervene if China attacks Taiwan was popular in Japan. Among young people 18 to 39 surveyed by Yomiuri 64% support Takaichi. Broadly speaking straight talk and nationalism iis becoming popular in Japan. The LDP has lost its majority in the lower and upper house in parliament and the Sanseito party with 15 seats and other smaller nationalist parties are increasing in popularity. The Ministry of Education has for many decades kept the Japanese wartime atrocities such as at Nanjing in China of the 1930's, the harsh Japanese occupation in China and Korea, out of the textbooks. The result is that Japanese young people do not have the same level of grasp of what happened in the twentieth century. ...

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A country smaller than the US state of Connecticut will host the first World Cup Soccer games in the Arab world from November 21 to December 18. England will play US , the day after Thanksgiving.

Group A  Netherlands with Qatar, Ecuador, Senegal

Group B   England with Iran, US, Wales or Scotland/Ukraine

Group C.  Argentina with Saudi, Mexico, Poland

Group D   France with Peru, Australia/United Arab Emirates, Denmark, Tunisia

Group E  Spain, Germany, Japan with Costa Rica or New Zealand

Group F  Belgium with Canada, Morocco, Croatia

Group G.  Brazil with Serbia, Switzerland, Cameroon

Group H   Portugal with Ghana, Uruguay, South Korea 

Defending champion France has it better in its group. 

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Tata Projects Limited is the lowest of two bidders at 860 crores for India's new parliament building. The old parliament building is considered inadequate today and was first opened in 1927 when the British first introduced local legislatures as a form of home rule in India. The time allowed for it to be built is a strict 21 months and will require putting a new face on the central Vista area that runs through the centre of New Delhi. It should generate jobs, and provide a fitting place for debating the many issues that face India in its drive for modernization, particularly today after the pandemic when many issues such as manufacturing, industrial development defense, agricultural modernization, infrastructure development are taking on new urgency. After almost three decades of slow progress India is now entering a new phase for speed and implementation of projects.

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Poliovirus could be present in New York wastewater as early as April 2022 evidence shows. In UK this could as early as February 2022. It shows the need for rigorous polio vaccination programs. Rockland and Orange counties in the New York City area have polio vaccination rates for eligible children as low as 60%, compared to a national rate of 93%. Decades of neglect of healthcare, and lack of investment in healthcare infrastructure and healthcare services, and in education for healthcare that was a major priority in the postwar years in the fifties and sixties have led to a situation where this is happening today. Vaccination rates are wholly inadequate and a 100% consensus that existed on key things such as vaccination needs to be recovered in the US, by changing the entire sense of priorities in society and the way it invests in its people.

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President Murmu addresses the first session at the new parliament building in New Delhi, India. In the tradition of British parliamentary democracy followed by India the opening speech of parliament is done by the president outlining the government's plans for the coming years. Murmu describes the achievements in providing basic infrastructure, water, cooking gas, rail and transport, food, healthcare to over 1 billion people in the last ten years, and controlling the cost of living. Making new investments in digital and other technologies, in infrastructure development to build an advanced economy under Vikshit Bharat by 2047, the 100th anniversary of independence from British rule. It also reflects women's empowerment and diversity in a democracy in Asia as Murmu was a schoolteacher in Orissa in the northeast and the Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman is a woman from the Chennai area in the south.

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Iran has collected 60% enriched uranium for 2 years by 2023, enough for 2 nuclear weapons, says this report in the WSJ. Israeli premier Netanyahu says this would invite a strike if weapons grade uranium is converted into a weapon. In this situation after Iran provided drones to Russia, president Biden has renewed efforts to reduce the level of escalation in the relations with Iran, opening up talks in New York and through Oman. Iran wants money that is held in other countries for oil and gas deliveries after US economic sanctions on Iran, to be released in exchange for limits on nuclear work and prisoner release. The Biden administration has approved 2.5 billion euros in payments by Iraq. Another $7 billion could be released from South Korea if diplomatic talks lead to Iran taking steps the US seeks from Iran. 

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At a critical juncture in the global fight against the pandemic eight in ten U.S. counties are in lockdown. About 29% of the U.S. economy is offline on April 5, 2020, according to Moody's Analytics. U.S. daily output has fallen by 29% compared to March 2019. Moody's Analytics predicts a 30% annualized decline in the second quarter GDP as businesses gradually reopen in the summer. Higher unemployment and loss of household wealth are likely to cause demand side drops making the recovery very gradual in this scenario. It all depends on how long this lasts and how effective the fight against the pandemic is including the steps taken to cut the spread of the virus, the action taken for rapid testing and isolating of clusters as happened in South Korea and Taiwan, which remain models for effective action. 

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PM Modi opens the new campus of an ancient university named Nalanda University which is dated from the 5th century AD to 12th century AD in Buddhist India. Nalanda means the gift of knowledge, that is also a theme for Lyrarc.com as an open site for all as a gift of knowledge. Near this campus is the Maha Vihara ancient Buddhist temple which has been restored after excavation from ruins. Modi is shown on the site of the ancient Buddhist temple in its current renovated state. Around Nalanda University are the other places of the Buddha- Kushinagar where the Buddha spent his last years, and Bodh Gaya where he attained enlightenment under a Bodhi tree in the 5th century BC. From here by the 5th century AD Buddhism spread to China, Korea, Vietnam and Japan, through Bodhidharma Indian prince who brought Buddhism to China.

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See stunning pictures of Denali and wild life in the snow in the Washington Post.

Denali means the "Tall One." Alaska Republican Senato Lisa Mukowski wants "Denali" and has Interior Secretary Don Borghum's approval to change the name back to Denali for Mount Mckinley. It was named Mckinley in 1917, but Alaskans and natives tribes have always known it for thousands of years as Denali. The irony some say is that Denali also means "the Great One," which fits in with MAGA. There is more concern in Denali Borough says this report, the area through which one goes to get to Mount Denali about funding for the National Park Service and park road repairs, renovations. Half a million tourists support the local economy and businesses. It is so important to Alaskans.

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A new bubble developing in Silicon Valley- the San Jose/Palto Alto/San Francisco area in the U.S.