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Concern about the spread of the pandemic in the U.S. with the upcoming Thanksgiving holiday and travel to visit family and friends. Seen from Australia and other countries American fatigue with staying at home is cause for concern. Yet this is not entirely American as governments in France plan to have a phased reopening by Christmas, with phase 2 partial lifting of restrictions of the lockdown on December 15. Austria has turned down German requests to close Austrian ski resorts that have cause spread in Europe. The Swiss have also kept ski resorts open. During the summer Croatia and parts of Spain kept open tourist spots to help the economy recover creating the conditions for spread as tourists went back home. 

Beyond this there a complex web of choices. From mental health to hospitals filling up, from jobs and income for service workers to people in nursing homes, all calling for different responses. 

 

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The collapse of the will of people around Yanukovych, including a deputy interior minister, as fighting units moved with weapons taken from an armory in Lviv towards Kiev, may have been the decisive event that decided the fate of the Yakunovych government. The deputy interior minister then negotiated with a protest leader Levus realizing that other than the front line of police the rest of the police were ready to abandon the fight. Levus then negotiated a safe corridor for the police to withdraw. As the Polish diplomat Sikorski came out to the square he found to his complete astonishment the police simply disappearing from the Square in Kiev. Hours earlier he had warned protesters that a crackdown was coming and they would all be wiped out, according to a report in the WSJ by Benoit, Norman and Fidler, 2/22/2014, so that they should accept a deal which would set a date for new elections but not lead to the immediate resignation of Yakunovych. That deal it also appears came after a Putin call to Yakunovych and not simply from diplomatic pressures, and it is probable that Putin had realized earlier than the diplomats that most of the police were not going to fight. Bringing in the army would have had dangerous consequences for relations between Germany and Russia in particular- as German public and chancellor Merkel felt strongly about the situation in Ukraine- and relations with the European Union and the U.S. Putin, Yakunovych, and even the EU diplomats may have missed the depth of feeling in Ukraine and the organization of the protest movement. Germany and chancellor Merkel, with her determination to make things come out right in Europe after a flawed history, gave hope to the protest movement. ...

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The effort by 90 German universities to provide education for free to the large number of refugees from North Africa and the Middle East that are being given a home in Germany in 2015-2016. In rural areas especially in former East Germany there is still uneasiness about the large number of refugees expected to come in 2015- but students and most people in urban areas are receptive. Yet the challenges remain as the university system is crowded with students and can accomodate only about a fourth of the refugges coming in 2015. The low unemployment rate and need for workers is helpful in absorbing such a large influx of people into the country. Volunteers and the German language classes will help better integrate the refugees into German society. Though there is a small minority of people opposed to immigration, Germany society remains largely open to taking in and helping the refugees, compared to the situation in Sweden and Denmark where recent elections showed parties with anti-immigration stance getting a larger share of the vote and becoming part of the government....

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The full text of the letter is given here. In this letter the U.S. sets out some important facts about events that happened during the coronavirus crisis during the crucial 4 month period from December 2019 to March 2020. Every week lost in this time due to reasons of a lack of transparency, openness meant hundreds of thousands of people more infected and tens of thousands of deaths worldwide. There are questions of transparency, of openness and this raises questions about the manner in which the World Health Assembly operates with hundreds of small countries in Africa and Asia having votes equal to that of the U.S., India, Brazil, Mexico with votes taken of over 200 countries. The entire election process can now be seen as questionable, when over a billion people in one country alone such as India or hundreds of millions in Brazil and Mexico would have to bear the consequences of poor decisions made by small countries that can be swayed in one direction or another based on political bias and other considerations that have nothing to do with global health.  At the conclusion of the letter by the U.S. to the current WHO shaped by a controversial election in 2017 the following is stated about the standards set by Gro Harlem Brundtland and which helped the world prevent the SARS crisis which originated in China in 2003 from spreading to the large countries of the world India, Brazil, Mexico, and other such countries in Asia and Africa, Latin America, and the U.S. European Union. "In 2003, in response to the outbreak of the Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) in China, Director-General Harlem Brundtland boldly declared the World Health Organization’s first emergency travel advisory in 55 years, recommending against travel to and from the disease epicenter in southern China. She also did not hesitate to criticize China for endangering global health by attempting to cover up the outbreak through its usual playbook of arresting whistleblowers and censoring media. Many lives could have been saved had you followed Dr. Brundtland’s example." Even this does not come to grips with the flawed way in which the election of WHO head is done. It can no longer be relied on when there is the danger that lack of transparency can emerge in the WHO leadership itself because of a flawed process. It risks endangering the lives and livelihoods of hundreds of millions in countries such as India, Brazil, Mexico, as well as in the relatively small countries of Africa and Latin America where even basic water supplies are at risk but which could tilt elections at the World Health Assembly. Consider that a cyclone just hit the Indian state of West Bengal and Bangladesh on May 20 just as the coronavirus pandemic is spreading. That this region of 1.5 billion people had just 2 votes out of over 200 cast at the World Health Assembly in 2017 shocking. And even these votes cast based on old geopolitical considerations not how good the candidate is, and how good the country he is coming from is in terms of its record  on public health. The irony here is that private foundations in the advanced countries in the U.S. and Europe some of whom are major donors to WHO did not think that more experienced candidates in their own countries with a better record of public health such as in France or Germany are better qualified, in a flawed NGO support mentality left from the Clinton years. Basically the people in these large countries such as India, Brazil, Mexico were disenfranchised, when the austerity policies were consuming the European Union, and the U.S. had just elected a new administration itself groping for ways to reverse years of neglect of public services and infrastructure priorities. They would trust good leaders no matter where they come from, who have a record of transparency, leadership, and all the values we cherish together no matter where we come from. ...

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Standard & Poors downgraded the U.S. credit rating from AAA to AA+. In its reasons for the downgrade the ratings agency said the "political brinksmanship" in debt ceiling and deficit reduction negotiations has made the process "less stable, less effective and less predictable." It said the $2.1 trillion savings under the August 2 Debt legislation falls short of what is needed to improve U.S. finances. David Beers, the head of the government debt ratings unit at S&P also said that "we don't think it's coming back any time soon." Countries that still have a AAA rating are Canada, France, Germany, and Britain. Countries with AA+ rating include New Zealand and Belgium.

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Elected to the Politburo in 1980, Gorbachev became president of USSR in 1985. In the six year period to 1991 he launched a movement to free the USSR from the rigid constraints of communist party rule called Perestroika to improve productivity, freedoms and quality of life. He came from a peasant family with Ukrainian origins and was born in 1931 during the period of upheaval in Russia. The rapid removal of Soviet rule was something Russia was not able to adapt to in the early years with no experience in democratic process. By 2000 after drop in life expectancy and fall in the standard of living Mr. Putin emerged as president.  Russia's economy recovered under Putin's three terms till the miscalculations in the invasion of Ukraine in 2022, that were itself a result of a sense that Russia had lost something with the fall of the Soviet Union and the advancement of NATO and the European Union. Gorbachev's sense in his memoirs was that Russia would do best under democracy. Even in 2017 he wrote that Russia and its people were "ready for a real multiparty system, fair elections and a regular rotation of government." Yet he was too much of an optimist and not enough hands on to grasp that Russia was a large economy and safeguards had to be put in place for the rule of law to prevent lawless elements that could control companies, safeguards for the vulnerable sections of society such as pensioners and older people, and limited self government through elected assemblies and parliaments were needed for a decade before democracy to take roots. Gorbachev's knowledge of American and British democracies, constitutions and parliaments and their evolution over centuries was non existent, with little contact and education of this sort under the Czar or Soviets. The democracies in Germany and Japan were established with American power and extensive education, the Marshall Plan, and unlimited imports by the US from Japan to prevent economic catastrophes of the kind experienced by the Weimar Republic in Germany in the 1920's. No plan from western aid and assistance, limited self government of the people was introduced as training ground as in India. In India the British introduced limited self-government or Swaraj in the 1930's with elected assemblies in Indian states, in the pattern of Dominion states such as Canada and Australia. Mohandas Gandhi negotiated the rights of indentured Indians in South Africa in this arrangement and studied British law and constitutions. This led to the catastrophic failure of the rule of law in Russia after 1979, lawless elements emerging under Yeltsin  that controlled companies and the state, high unemployment, failure of the economy, and drop in life expectancy between 1979 and 2005. How this led to the Putin years and now led to the war in Ukraine is covered in more detail under the Lyrarc article on Gorbachev and how he is seen in Germany. ...

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Stanley-Becker of the Washington Post looks at the story of Horst Kasner, Lutheran pastor in East Germany, Angela Merkel's father. In 1954 when Angela was born, her father moved the family to East Germany, then called the German Democratic Republic. The family settled in 1957 near the town of Templin in the Brandenburg countryside. He had an idealism based on the Lutheran faith and believed at the time that it was possible to build a East German Protestanism that reconciled with the professed socialist ideals of the GDR. Over three decades that faith was tested and by 1990 Kasner was known for his dissent to the state repression practiced by the GDR limiting free expression and religious beliefs. He worried about the domination of economic thinking even in the churches after the reunification.   Angela Merkel was close to her mother, Herlind Kasner, who joined the Social Democrats after reunification. Her brother joined the Greens. Merkel joined the movement called the Democratic Awakening in 1989, which merged with the Christian Democrats after reunification. Horst Kasner died in 2011 about 6 years after Merkel became chancellor. Speaking at a church in Templin in 2014, Merkel said what she believes- "God created every human being. We should strive for perfection. But we can make mistakes." To some Merkel remains inscrutable, hard to make out. This may be because she retains some of the thoughtful way her father meditated on what life was about and how best to live it.  ...

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The US and Japan are coordinating efforts to limit transfer of sensitive technology to China and increase trade and cooperation within the G-7 in high technology sectors. Efforts are being coordinated with South Korea. Janet Yellen says the IMF has overblown the effects on the world economy from the US decoupling from China. IMF reports have also in addition presented India incorrectly as a non aligned country, when it is a close partner of the US. In 2023 US is the largest trade partner of India.The US position is to limit flows of technology in sectors considered vital, and continue world trade in other areas with China. US is committed to friendshoring to India, Vietnam and other countries. Germany's three parties CDU, Greens and SPD are reversing close trade and technology links with China. This is also the policy of the Modi administration which seeks close trade and technology ties to US and EU. The shift is in response to what is really an overconcentration of the supply chain in China that happened as business in the US and EU and the Merkel and the Bush-Obama-Trump administrations failed to see the risks of overconcentration. And carried out misguided policies in trade and investment that are now being reversed by US president Biden, Kishida in Japan, and Modi in India. ...

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About one third of cars in China will be electric cars by the end of 2023 from one fourth today. Compare this with 6% of cars being electric in the US. EU, US and Japan are far behind. Toyota has only now ramped up EV's with a new CEO. In the domestic Chinese market 80% of EV's are made by Chinese auto manufacturers, And this could go up to 90%.  This means the share of the Chinese market for German and US manufacturers is actually shrinking. Chinese buyers now prefer Chinese brands over foreign brands. Over 4 decades says Keith Bradsher in NYT the US and European auto manufacturers trained a whole generation of Chinese auto engineers who now work for Chinese electric auto makers. This is one market in which China has built a formidable capacity. This is also a big contribution to cutting emissions from fossil fuel powered cars after China's massive use of fossil fuels over two decades worsening climate change.

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General Patrick Sanders former chief of the British armed forces tells graduates at Sandhurst Military Academy in the UK- "We have always fought with our backs to the wall. This is who we are.” “So if you fight, and my experience has been that you will, sooner or later, it will likely be as the British Army always has: isolated, overmatched in numbers, equipment and technology, with tenuous supply lines and before the country has mobilised,” he added. Reading US General Pershing's "My Experiences in the World War" one finds the same message about what he had learned from his experience leading the US Expeditionary forces that put one million Americans into France in 1917. US slow to mobilize in the face of unfolding German threat in Europe. Acting earlier the US Pershing believes would have had a decisive voice in settlement and not accepted the armistice that led to another world war. Every leader in that war trained under Pershing- Marshall, Eisenhower, MacArthur. ...

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NYT reporters Lyman and Eddy show how the city of Weimar in Germany is coping with the arrival of about 900 refugees, and how well the integration efforts are working.

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ECB president, Mario Draghi, said on March 25, 2014, "we will do what is needed to maintain price stability." Annual inflation in the eurozone declined to 0.6% forecast for the eurozone, 0.9% for Germany, and a negative 0.2% in Spain, for Feb. 2014.

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US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi will spend Tuesday night August 2 in Taipei, Taiwan. China has threatened severe consequences and Taiwanese forces are on alert. Yet with over $1 trillion in China's exports to US and EU in 2021 the response will have to take this into account as also the US and EU to redesign its supply chains. This is the first trip of a senior US official to Taiwan as Speaker Pelosi comes next to the Vice President to succeed the presidency. The US response to the Russian attack on Ukraine was made in Biden's word as a deterrent to China in its role in the Indo-Pacific region. The Pelosi trip may be a reflection of this policy that seeks to maintain the US position that Indo-Pacific is international waters, that US policy will continue as before undeterred by actions such as the Russian attack on Ukraine with the support of China. And that US will engage fully with allies in the Indo-Pacific- Indonesia, Singapore, Malaysia and Taiwan. And that is doing this with the cooperation of its allies in the region- Australia, Japan and India. US and EU imports from China are $541 and $522 billion over $1 trillion for 2022. Loss of even a significant portion of these exports from major tensions in the region would have a severe impact on Chinese economic growth. The US and EU are already engage in redesigning the supply chain and would also face problems in a transition similar to the gas rationing in Germany after cutoff of Russian supplies. The trade is too big a factor at this time. ...

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Greens and SPD Social Democrat parties in Germany favor social spending, infrastructure spending, and climate change investments. Free Democrats party holding the Finance ministry supports  a brake on spending. There is no agreement on the budget in this coalition, says DW.com. SPD and FDP are not increasing in popularity and SPD could lose the chancellorship if there is a new election. The Greens and the CDU are increasing in popularity. For this reason the coalition is likely to continue even with this disagreement on spending.  SPD and Greens say higher taxes and elimination of some subsidies is one solution. The common platform has not resolved these differences. In the US president Biden has retained the support of voters in the midterm elections and has gained bipartisan support for building infrastructure and investing in renewable energy, cutting health care costs.

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Seen as a rural urban divide, less educated and well educated and tech workers the situation in France looks similar to that in the US in the elections of 2016 and 2020. With business in the US and European Union shifting manufacturing to China and the governments neglecting rural areas, decline in standard of living for people on pensions that have not kept up with the cost of living, the situation in France as in the US is decades in the making. Bernie Sanders and Melenchon were appealing in different ways to younger people yearning for change and a system that would correct these changes.   Melenchon coming this close to less than one percentage point of Le Pen in the first round of French elections shows that a straight Macron Le Pen version of what has happened is an oversimplification, just as seeing the changes in America under president Biden vs Trump would be a simplification, as voters for Sanders who voted for Biden are changing the Biden agenda and setting America on a new path. A path to reshoring jobs that were sent to China, rebuilding American manufacturing, increasing workers wages and restoring workers leverage for higher wages, investing $2 trillion in child care, housing, supporting worker incomes and families, supporting older Americans on pensions. In the same way beneath the idea that nothing has happened after the yellow vest protests for cost of living, that has not only not gone away- but increased in the concern for cost of living in this election with the surging inflation - new developments are happening.  Even as Germany under Merkel appeared not be changing in 2020- 1 year after Merkel the situation will have changed completely to address social concerns that were ignored earlier and to invest in infrastructure in a big way. Behind this is a fundamental change that is taking place. Facing a challenge from totalitarian states the fabric of society in the free world, the US, Germany, France, other EU states, India, and nations in the free world will have to respond with changes that restore the fabric of society to what it was before this kind of fracturing, bringing all parts of society together to bring all the energies in place for rebuilding, investing in infrastructure, restoring local manufacturing and renewal. It requires a unified effort to be put in place to respond in the right way.     ...

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What a change DJT's first 100 Days and actions on immigration and tariffs , Ukraine and Russia, have made in China's and World relations in Asia, and in Europe - all for the better, significantly better relations worldwide.  China has worked out a peace settlement in Ladakh frontier with India. It has come together in Tokyo with Japanese prime minister Ishiba and China's Foreign Minister Wang Yi holding hands, and South Korea joining, all three nations vowing to remember history and work together. In Europe Russia is being brought back into the community of nations for big power cooperation with the US after 3 years of war in Ukraine. And Germany has removed its constitutional brake on spending that frees up $1 trillion in funding for infrastructure to replace much of its rail and other infrastructure built in 1900. One would not know this reading the NYT on democracy or the WSJ on tariffs or the Washington Post on assault on federal workforce, or the Atlantic, Politico, DW.com or FR24, Der Spiegel, nor Le Monde, much of the world media slanted on way or another. One does not hear about military exercises so often as the world realizes that so called large economies China, Germany, Japan and India all depend on American goodwill and willingness to give rather than take for most of the post war period since 1950. For the last 6 years in the latter half of the Trump administration and the 4 years of the Biden administration during the pandemic relations between China and the US deteriorated and China first retreated into its own then opened up a bit. The initial idea that it could manage the DJT trade actions evaporated as Biden continued the DJT first round of tariffs. Now Navarro, Lighhizer, and his deputy Jamieson are all back advising DJT for anew round of reciprocal tariffs and tariffs on Canada, Mexico and China for not stopping fentanyl flows.  In 2022 in eastern Ladakh China's PLA had a big standoff with Indian forces in eastern Ladakh at Galwan and Pangong Lake. The Quad was active with Australia India and the US in Indo Pacific and China conducted military exercises close to Taiwan.      ...

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A prelude to the Ukraine counteroffensive appears to be taking place as Ukraine gets more military aid from the US, UK and Germany. Missile capabilities are also increasing with UK and German assistance. 

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On Gandhi Jayanti remembering American president FDR's contribution to Hind Swaraj. FDR rejected Churchill's ideas of retaining the British Empire's colonies while fighting the German Nazis in the name of freedom. FDR said- " India should be made a commonwealth at once. After a certain number of years- 5 perhaps or 10- she should be able to choose whether she wants to remain in the Empire or have complete independence." 

FDR (US president Franklin Roosevelt) said -"I can't believe that we can fight a war against fascist slavery, and at the same time not work to free people all over the world from a backward colonial policy."

 

 

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Newspapers and media from Argentina to Germany and France praise the effort of the new U.S. Attorney General in prosecuting the case against FIFA, and taking on the challenge of acting in a case that crosses international boundaries. The use by people investigated in the case of the American banking system and the new willingness of banks to cooperate with federal investigations provides Lynch with the basis of building a strong case.

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Fred Hiatt of The Washington Post asks the question what would have happened if U.S. president Harry Truman had sounded the retreat for war weary Americans following the Second World War- as Greece floundered, during the Berlin Blockade 1948-1949 when Truman ordered airlifts to Berlin which totaled 200,000 in one year from the U.S. and allies, as South Korea was invaded by the Communist North in 1949 when Truman responded with the landing at Inchon. He cites an intervew with president Obama in the Atlantic magazine of Jeffrey Goldberg, where Obama's views after hours of conversations are summarized as being- that the Middle East cannot be fixed during the Obama years in office, and not for a generation, so that it would be better to simply do nationbuilding in the U.S. He points to Trump's interview with the Washington Post about pursuing a similiar policy because the U.S. is much poorer today than it was in the past. Hiatt says the U.S. GDP per capita was $27,000 in 1945, $62,000 today. And who would have thought in 1953 as the Korean War wound down and Federal Republic of Germany under Adenauer was emerging, Japan recovering from the devastation of the war, that South Korea, Japan and Germany, would one day be America's strongest trading partners and prosperous democracies. It was not about nationbuilding but lending a hand when needed, and the countries having to lift themselves up by the bootstraps- yet during a severe crisis as in Greece, Berlin, Seoul, in the 1950's when the post war Europe and East Asian countries were being established and needed help, the U.S. offered the early security and economic support needed to allow nationbuilding to happen by people in these places pulling themselves up by the bootstraps over a subsequent longer period. Truman did not shrink from the challenge and set the groundwork for today's European Union, and for today's Japan and South Korea. ...

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Is the UK government committed to keeping the triple lock on pensions that help pensioners, retirees, keep up with the cost of living. Liz Truss the UK prime minister waffles on this issue by first saying yes, then no, then yes. The US just announced social security payments to retirees will increase by 8.6% in 2023. The triple lock is a way of saying that pensions will be increased each year by the maximum of inflation or average earnings, and more than 2.5%. With inflation at over 10% UK pensions would be increased similar to the US, slightly higher by 10%. This is critical to meet needs of older Britons or Americans, and similar policies are being followed in France, Germany and other EU countries. Housing costs are rising very rapidly. This leaves less for food and heating. This means some older Britons or Americans are missing meals. In Britain a TUC report shows one of seven Britons missing meals because of income not keeping up with the cost of living crisis, which is now number one on people's minds.  ...

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EU leaders meeting in Brussels agreed on Dec. 12 for a single banking supervisor for large banks in the eurozone. The European Central Bank will act as the supervisor with powers to force banks to raise capital buffers and close banks it considers unsafe. The Federal Reserve, U.S.'s central bank, has similiar powers in the U.S. Germany's finance minister Schauble says the national parliaments would be able to ratify the new supervisor by Feb. 2013, and the new supervisor should be in place by March 2013. Differences between Germany and France on which banks should come under the supervision of the ECB were resolved by giving the ECB resposibility for banks that have over 30 billion euros in assets, are over 20% of a country's GDP, or operate in at least two countries. At least 3 banks in each country in the eurozone would come under ECB supervision. The remaining smaller banks would remain under national supervision as Germany had insisted earlier. The focus now is on coming up with a common resolution authority for winding down failing banks, a function performed by the FDIC in the U.S. These are two of the three major parts of the new European financial architecture to support the euro currency. The third is deposit insurance, which is provided by the FDIC in the U.S. system. It is a major step forward and clears the way for direct recapitalization of banks in Spain and Ireland, two countries affected by having to take on responsibility for failing banks. By breaking the link between sovereign debt and failing banks the new agreements makes it possible for these countries to return to economic growth....