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Lindy Boggs, U.S. Congresswoman from Louisiana, who led the fight for civil rights in a deeply segregated South, and was a pioneer for financial rights of women.

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Joe Biden, US president says the US will have 300 million vaccine doses by the end of July. 200 million more vaccine doses, with 100 million from Pfizer and 100 million from Moderna are part of new finalized purchases by the Biden government in February 2021. Biden says vaccine supplies were in much worse shape than he thought after the last 2 months of the Trump administration led to distractions that affected handling of the pandemic. 

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Germany's leading candidate for chancellor Merz gets an exemption for Germany to EU Common European Asylum System (CEAS) asylum laws for National Security reasons. The goal is to tight Schengen border controls to keep out illegal migrants.  EU president Von der Leyen calls Merz action on CEAS  asylum laws "innovative solutions." Germany takes U turn on asylum law as public opinion shifts with a series of crimes committed by illegal migrants allowed to stay in Germany including car rampages through crowds on streets, most recently in Munich. A sense of fatigue in EU with illegal migrants and a desire for normalcy, the old way of life, and secure neighborhoods and urban spaces. It is now seen in CDU as Merkel's policy errors and failure of judgement in letting in a flood of illegal migration.

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Nokia announced a loss of 929 million euros for the first quarter of 2012. Sales declined from 10.4 billon euros to 7.4 billion euros in the same quarter prior year. The only bright spot for the company is that the Lumia 900 sold throught AT&T has made a successful launch in the U.S. Nokia CEO Elop says the phone is sold out in stores in the U.S. Lumia sales were 2 million in the 1st quarter of 2012, at an average price of 220 euros ($290). Nokia's strategy now is to bring the Lumia line including the lower end Luma 610 phone to Asian markets by June- to China, Singapore, Vietnam, Taiwan, Indonesia and Malaysia. Nokia's biggest problem is the older Symbian phones, which consumers are passing by and which now have to be discounted rapidly or replaced quickly with the Lumia line. The other related problem is falling margins on basic phones as Chinese competitors discount heavily- basic Nokia phone prices fell 18% to 33 euros ($43) from 40 euros or($52) the prior year. The speed in the drop in business for mobile phones can be guaged from the sales decline of 40% in the 1st quarter from $9.3 billion to $5.6 billion. Things are made worse by the 772 million euro ($1 billion) charge taken for Nokia Siemens Networks, a network joint venture with Siemens. Sales for Nokia Siemens fell 7% in the first quarter to $3.8 billion. Nokia Siemens has 53 contracts to build new mobile networks with Long Term Evolution Technology more than competitors Ericsson and Huawei, according to Nokia Siemens. Everything now depends on the speed with which Nokia can move to its Lumia line across the board, especially in China....

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UK Denton (Manchester region) by-election gives Greens 40% Reform 29% and Labour 24%- as Greens replace Labour in UK in 2026 with disapproval of Starmer's leadership. Starmer appeared to be not thinking for himself and letting his campaign manager Morgan McSweeney run the government's strategies in serving working class voters a key Labour constituency. McSweeney at every turn pushed Starmer in a direction of diluting policies that were intended to serve working class voters to chase the Reform vote. That strategy has failed and won Starmer 18% approval among the British public. It just appeared to work in the last 2024 election but it may have been an understanding of that vote that was completely wrong as Labour won by small margins in many constituencies. A key opportunity has been lost for Labour by both Corbyn's dogmatic behaviours and Starmer's lack of authenticity and personla leadership for Britain, following the failures of the Cameron-Johnson years under the Tories, and before that with Blair, three decades lost for Britain to build a brighter future. ...

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Iraq's population is estimated to be 44-46 million, double that of 1997 the last time a census was done in the country. A census is taking place across Iraq to get a better idea of the population. With one Mp for 100,000 people seats in parliament will increase to 450 from 329. Shias share power with Sunnis and Kurds under an arrangement set by the US in 2003.

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High oil prices have reduced oil demand by about 8% compared to last year. The EIA looks at gas demand average for 2017 to 2019 and finds that in late February 2022 it was 99% of this average, in May it was 93% and June 95%. US refineries have cut production by 800,000 barrels a day since the pandemic began causing oil shortages, and shale oil companies are reluctant to make the investments to scale up production.

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Dr Norman Borlaug passes away at 95. He was a plant scientist who invented special rust fungus resitant varieties of wheat through work for the Rockefeller Foundation in Mexico. In this work he used the climate of the Sonoran desert and the Mexican highlands to develop this rust resistant wheat variety. He came up with asmaller wheat plant which with fertilizer counld increase yields enormously. Brough up in Minnesota of Norwegian parents, he studied in aone room schoolhouse and pursued his doctorate in plant sciences at the University of Minnesota during the depression. At this time he saw hungry people in Minneapolis, and this stayed with him as he was persuaded to take up the job with the Rockefeller Foundation in Mexico after working at Du Pont. Mexico meant dismal conditions and vast amounts of travel between the desert and the highlands. But his unflagging persistance and good humor in these difficult conditions led to results with the new varieties of wheat. This was then used in Mexico and later in India and Pakistan in the 70's with the wheat crop in 1968 maring the beginning of ther green revolution. ...

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Connor Hellebuyck US ice hockey goalie who turned in 41 saves for the 2-1 win by US over Canada at Olympics in Milan 2026. He had a 96% saved percentage in the Olympics and a 92% saved percentage for the Winnipeg Jets for last 3 seasons. And yet he struggled in some periods when he was not at his best. No one knew he would turn in his best performance ever at this game.

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Talarico beat Crockett in Texas Democrat primary and Senator Cornyn at 42% edges out Attorney General Paxton in Texas Republican primary.  DJT likely to endorse Cornyn and calls for Republicans to avoid ads and infighting. $131 million spent on this Texas primary, $99 million for Republicans. Democrats are unlikely to win in Texas, but the infighting is of concern to the president because of the margin  for control in the US Senate.