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German response to Greenland tariff is muted- "appropriate response at appropriate time" realizing that Denmark and Nordic countries not Poland, Austria, Hungary, Russia, China, and other countries are concerned about Greenland, and after action by Denmark's government that "is going nowhere" in the words of DJT.  Denmark has misrepresented the facts and US history in relation to Greenland's exploration by US Navy and Adm. Perry in 1890's is ignored, Denmarks colonial power history is left out which is how it acquired Greenland in 1813 in Treaty of Kiel with Sweden in exchange of territory during Napoleonic Wars. Much of this can easily be researched and it is baffling that the Danish socialist party government is bringing NATO into this as it has to do with security of the eastern seaboard of the US, a concern since the early days of the founding of the Republic of the US since 1820's.

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British MP raises issue of Arab Gulf countries providing 37% of China's oil imports, excluding Iraq 27%, vs 11% from Iran and 20% from Russia- 2024 US EIA. Tom Tugendhat says China has to balance its interests in the region after the closure of the Straits of Hormuz, between Iran, Gulf monarchies, and Russia. China also faces a more credible choice of accelerating the development of renewable energy in the same way that India and the European Union face. US will act as a supplier of last resort  adding Venezuelan and other supplies but temporarily as the entire Middle East region poses quandaries for China, the US, and India, European Union. The quandary stems from the irreconciliable differences between religious sects in the region, post 1950 ideological and religious militancy,  in which neither China, India, the US, Russia or the European Union wants to get drawn into after 5 decades of bitter experience in the Middle East.

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The WSJ's Paul Sonne gives this exceptional account of how Russians are coping in the economic crisis of 2015-2016, with the twin shocks of the collapse in the ruble and the collapse in oil prices. He does this by looking at the Kaluga region, a provincial city 110 miles south of Moscow that has benefitted from large foreign investment to meet the needs of 20 million consumers in the Moscow region. The governor of Kaluga since 2000, Anatoly Artamonov, worked hard to attract foreign investment that includes VW, Volvo AG, Continental AG, Lafarge, Samsung Electronics, General Electric, and other companies. He ran a collective in the Brezhnev era, and now is energetic in meeting needs of foreign investors. Karmanov says it is stupidity to not say he is talking to business people in other parts of the world because of the political climate in the country. About 42% of the industrial output in Kaluga comes from the foreign automobile plants, including VW. The automobile and light commercial vehicle production in Feb. 2015 dropped by about 39% compared to Feb. 2014, according to the Association of European Business estimate. Only 40% of autombile production cost from assembly lines is sourced locally, the rest is imported at the new value of the ruble which has fallen about 50%, leading to higher prices and slumping demand. Ordinary Russians are feeling the effects of the crisis with higher prices. Consumer price inflation in Feb. 2015 was at 16.7%, with 23.3% increase in food prices. High interest rates to prop up the ruble meant cutting off access to credit to finance consumer purchases. An 8% drop in real wages in Jan. 2015, according to Capital Economics, added to pressures on consumers. With the political and economic crisis following Russia's Ukraine intervention foreign investment in 2014 declined to $18.6 billion in 2014 compared to $61.5 billion in 2013, and the EBRD bank cut financing with the sanctions....

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Microsoft and Amazon to invest$17.5 billion and $35 billion in India  dat centers by 2030. Google plans to invest $15 billion with partners Airtel and Adani Group for a total of $67.5 billion. Renewable energy in Hyderabad costs 7 cents for one kilowatt hour compared to 18 cents on average in the US. TPG of the US is working with Tata Group on AI data centre in Hyderabad and others in India. Till recently most of India's data was stored in Singapore. Even today India has only 5% of the data center capacity in the world and yet consumes most of the data in the world because of it's growing population.

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Early elections in Turkey for parliament and the presidency called by president Erdogan are giving the opposition a chance. The economic growth during the early Erdogan years is beginning to fade with Turkey's rising debt levels, companies with large debt repayment, and the loss of half the value of Turkish currency Lira since 2014.  Muharram Ince of the Republican People's Party, CHP, is able to connect to religious voters from his secular base. The CHP has allied itself with the Islamist SP Party, and the nationalist party Iyi led by Meral Aksener. This alliance is now poised to challenge Mr. Erdogan in the coming election with a different combination of forces loosening Mr. Erdogan's grip on Islamist voters and nationalist voters, by bringing together the nationalist, secular and Islamist in a new way. The focus of this alliance is not dividing the country between Islamist and secular as in recent elections, but more along the lines of keeping some of the basic elements of democracy eroded in Mr. Erdogan's efforts to setup what the opposition leader Mr. Ince calls a "one man regime." As in Malaysia's recent election corruption is also an issue raised by the opposition. ...

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Atsuyoshi Koike of Japan's Rapidus co-developing with IBM new 2 nanometer chip for production in 2026, wafer by wafer in 15 days instead of in batches taking 50 days. Koike says he will charge a Shinkansen fee referring to the bullet trains in Japan. He sees the failure by Japan to join the US in co-producing chips as a mistake, ceding ground to Taiwan's TSMC and South Korea's Samsung. Japan's government supports Rapidus with $600 million in funding and anotehr $1.7 billion comes from Japanese companies Sony, NTT and others. By comparison TSMC will invest $56 billion to produce advanced chips in scale in 2026. Japan is step by step getting back into the chip business by making a joint effort with the US.

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"Not ideal" says Ben Stokes, "yeah disappointing" says Steve Smith, about the 10mm of grass on the pitch that led to 20 wickets on the first day 36 wickets by the second day. Cricket Australia is disappointing a lot of fans when the Test match at MCG cricket grounds is over in 2 days- not since 1904 has something like this happened at MCCG- and there is an investigation, too much left to the cricket grounds preparation experts without supervision by Cricket Australia. Stokes says to be brutally honest it was bad for 90,000 fans. About England critics after losing 3 Tests, Stokes says that now goes to zero the idea of England not having won at all. Stokes and Root hug in the locker room, a sign of relief.

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MAGA and change in thinking about solar energy because of its use in powering AI and keeping utility bills low.

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For a long time CNN struggled with how it could avoid the peaks and valleys of viewer attention for its news programs- with a jump in viewers when a big news event happens and then a fall in viewers when not much is happening. Programs like Anthony Bourdain's "Parts Unknown," have helped CNN tackle this problem. At first in 2012 and early 2013 when Bourdain's name came up in discussions at CNN for such a show, there was much disagreement about it, as some did not see the merits of bringing in someone who is not a journalist. By 2012 Bourdain had achieved prominence with his program on food "no Reservations," on Travel Channel. CNN's approach was to have a non-journalist take people around the world and tell stories about life and culture of the country and its people, in unique restaurant settings. By having a doumentary travel series CNN hoped to use the flexibility to delay a show if a news event broke out. Many viewers take tips on travel from the show. It has an enthusiastic following, thanks partly to Bourdain's style which is informal, relaxed, and jovial. Especially how he doesn't take himself seriously, and not thinking too much about Obama's guest appearance on the show at a small restaurant in Vietnam, where Bourdain picks up the tab of $6. That has won him over 800,000 viewers consistently from the 1st to the seventh season of the show. ...

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Hiking and long walks as a way to break up the endless monotony of work and improve fitness, reducing stress and anxiety. A breath of fresh air and views of the countryside. the clarity of mind that comes with it. Putting everything aside and heading out on a long long walk. Pick a route that suits your ability and don't let anything hold you back. Hiking is great. There are many routes in every region of the world, explore and head out.

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Mark Landler of NYT provides the background of the relationship with China and Taiwan during the Reagan administration. Reagan criticized the decision to abrogate recognition of Taiwan as a candidate and in 1982 pushed for Six Assurances, one of which was the assertion that the U.S. did not formally recognize Chinese sovereignty over Taiwan. Mr. Trump told a news channel that he doesn't see why the U.S. is bound by a One China policy, and that this would have to be part of a deal that included trade, and solving problems related to North Korea, and the South China Sea island fortifications. 

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Geithner in written testimony to the Senate Finance Committee, stated that "President Obama - backed by the conclusions of a broad range of economists- believes that China is manipulating its currency." What is noteworthy is that experts are generally in agreement that something should be done about this in cooperative fashion, from Obama's economic team, Obama's own views on this, The National Association of Maufacturers, Labor and so on. The trade deficit with China has continued at high levels even with the current economic slowdown, so this issue remains as one that the Bush administration never really addressed. Simon Johnson, a MIT Professor, and former IMF Chief economist says that even the IMF has not addressed it, and that the Obama administration needs to call China to account. He says this could lead to a spat with China, and if the US does not back down to a row. The concern has been that China would not buy up Treasury debt the way it has in the past, at the same time the question is whether there is some point where the deficit is so large and the US so dependent on foreign buyers of Treasury debt, that it needs to be addressed on a number of levels. Including addressing currency and fair trade issues, a more rational balanced consumption of everything from oil to goods from lowcost Asian countries, to reduce the toll on the overextended American consumer and on the extent of US borrowing needed. From China's perspective there may also be the same concern about export led growth, which may come to be seen as undependable anyway, because with or without some currency advantage the overextended US consumer is not buying anyway, holding off on purchases of everying from cars to flatscreen televisions. With growth at 6.8% in 4th quarter 2008, according to the Chinese Government Statistics Bureau, and expected to drop to 5% in 2009, the export growth model is no longer the panacea for China's unemployed as it once was at 12-13% growth rates in 2006-2007. In fact it may now look to be a better wiser policy if China had increased the value of its currency even more than its slow gradual approach to slow the growth rate from 12-13% to a more sustainable 9-10%, and lower American imports and lower the American trade deficit. Part of the problem in China was the difficulty of applying any sort of brakes once the local governments were set free to expand as much as they could, and prevented any controls from being effective. Steel production continued to grow even after there was evidence of large overcapacity, and government direction failed. Buy some time to shift to domestic consumption based recovery, is what the Chinese policy may be now. Indications of this are evident with its grappling at the issues it has not tackled like giving ownership of land to farmers in rural areas, and to building a healthcare system for the country, both of which are part of a host of issues to shift to domestic consumption based recovery. So unlike the way the media and some experts portray it its not a tough line that the US is taking against Chinese unwillingness. China may want to cooperate.That may be true if China was missing out on 10-13% growth rates, but these were unsustainable anyway and bad policy. At growth rates below 5% as projected by analysts China may want to jettison the export model of growth and build an alternative one. In that case as China shifts to domestic consumption, currency adjustments may be seen quite differently than they were in the past....

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The 7 Priorities listed in India's Budget for April 2023 to March 2024 provide a roadmap for the next 25 years to 2047 when India marks 100 years as an independent nation. These are-Inclusive Development Reaching the last mile, Infrastructure and investment, Unleashing the potential Green growth, Youth power, Financial sector

Reaching the last mile- Gandhi's idea- "Ask yourself if the step you contemplate is of any use to him or her (the poorest and weakest man or woman you have seen), will he or she gain anything by it? Will it restore to him (or her) control of their life and destiny."

A fund will be setup for Agri-startups. A National Digital Library will be set up for children and adolescents and States will be encouraged to setup physical libraries at panchayat and ward levels.

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More answers on more questions by readers, this time from the Guardian.

How does Britain get out of this mess- finding a deal acceptable to all, the Tories right wing, Labour party, and the EU, which isn't likely any time soon. Extending Article 50 beyond March 29, only adds a few months.

Is the UK going insane asked one reader. The answer from the Guardian- yes.

 

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At Stuyvesant, the most selective of New York public schools the student body is 74% Asian, 19% WHite, 3% Latino, and 1% African American. Mayor Blasio of New York is using the Discovery Program to limit the entry to the program which accounts for about 5% of the overall admissions to kids from schools that have a poverty rate of 60% or higher instead of to economically disadvantaged children in the city.  Two views are presented here. One that of the New York schools chancellor, Richard Carranza who says "I just don't buy the narrative that any one ethnic group owns admissions to these schools." Mayor Blasio of New York says that only 10% of Black and Latino students get offers from the specialized high schools even though they account for nearly 70% of the city's high school population. The other view is that the state is failing in its secondary schools system because New York state tests show only 47% of the city's third through eighth graders proficient in English and 43% in Math, with the number for Black and Latino students dropping to 34% for English and 25% for Math. This means about half or two thirds of New York state's school children cannot read proficiently and the numbers decline with socioeconomic conditions. Even Mayor Blasio is working at the fringes as the problem is deeper and needs to be fixed at another level than by tweaking which segment of the economically disadvantage children should have access to the best schools such as Stuyvesant.   ...

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Bank of America CEO, Brian Moynihan sees economic growth at 2.5% for the U.S. in 2014, and global economic growth for GDP at 3.5%. He expects the Fed to continue its bond buying program in 2014 to prevent any backsliding in economic growth in the U.S.

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A survey of 414 National Association of Business Economics (NABE) economists shows Libertarian candidate Gary Johnson with 15%, overtaking Trump at 14% on who would best manage the economy. On protectionist views only 9% support this. 15% said they have no opinion and 55% said Hillary Clinton would do the best job of managing the economy. About 62% say the election uncertainty is holding back growth. Some aspects of Hillary Clinton's economic plan are the $275 billion infrastructure investment over 10 years, taking action against companies that ship jobs overseas, a capital gains tax paln that encourages long term investments, supporting $15 minimum wage, making upward mobility a top priority, providing government financed access to public colleges for working class and lower income groups. Donald Trump's plan has suffered form lack of specifics, shifting comments, lack of careful study, and excessive use of slogans. Both candidates oppose trade agreements that shift jobs overseas. Trump's plan also suffers from lack of credibility overseas as this is important in a global business structure, with fears of protectionism increasing. and reminding people of the protectionism under Smoot-Hawley that increased the damage from the depression of the thirties. ...

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Behind H-P's allegation of "serious accounting improprieties" is the misclassifcation of hardware sales as software sales. Hardware sales of 10-15% were unprofitable at Autonomy and helped to inflate margins from 30% to over 40% before the acquisition by H-P. H-P's Apotheker let his views of Autonomy as a growth engine and bonding with Autonomy founder Mike Lynch affect the process of due diligence, which is obvious now was not thorough in all aspects.

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One fifth of Kviv's population of 3 million has left the city, 4000 apartment buildings are without electricity in Kviv, this winter January 2026. This is the worst of the last couple of winters of the war, as Russia attacks energy infrastructure in Kviv on a large scale even as peace talks continue. Russia insists on control of Donbas region. Much of Ukraine today remembers a famine from the Soviet period, Russia remembers its proud history, language and culture from its beginnings in the Kviv region around the 14th century, that is the what this conflict is about. On one dimension it is about NATO and European Union expansion on another about the history and culture, language in a Russian language part of the world and the effort of Ukraine in the 21st century to seek a new identity. It is a struggle between fraternal people in the Russian region and in that sense a tragedy. It doesn't have to be one for Europe, for Germany. NATO was created when the Soviet Union expanded after 1948 and Britain was a key protagonist of NATO. Would its disbanding after Soviet Union disbanded leaving Russia as a country with centuries of its own history, would this have been the right action. If needed a new organization with a new name and Russia invited to join, would this have helped? Could this have focused attention on a new power as chancellor Merz has said, the new power being China being something requiring attention. The US is beginning to have new thoughts in this winter on 2026. The northern European nations (Britain, Poland, Finland and the Nordic countries, Baltics) have historical conflicts for centuries among themselves, they appear to be using NATO for their own historical conflicts. The US understands this, it is looking for a way to get a peace settlement so it can focus on the western hemisphere and not entangle itself in northern European conflicts that have been happening since 1600 with changing actors. The Republican have taken the lead under DJT for a new approach to put American people and their wellbeing, their right to live free of drugs(Mexico, Venezuela, Colombia), to live free of illegal migrants (Guatemala, Mexico, Venezuela), and improve on the shaky supply chains that were concentrated in China to bring jobs home that were lost by the millions (tariff policy), and to make living affordable (energy, agriculture).  ...

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Egypt's presidential candidate Mohammed Morsi, leads in the first round of presidential elections over Amr Moussa. He has no ties with the Mubarak regime and comes from the Muslim Brotherhood. Morsi is an engineer trained in Egypt and the U.S. Morsi graduated with bachelors and masters degree in engineering from Cairo University, and a PhD. from the University of Southern California in 1982. From 1982 to 1985, he was a professor at California State University at Northridge, California. In 1985 he returned to teach at a university in Egypt. He was elected to parliament as an independent candidate as the Mubark regime banned the Muslim Brotherhood. In 2011 he was elected head of the Freedom and Justice Party and made its candidate for president. Because of the severe economic problems facing Egypt- a demographic explosion of young people with few job opportunities, enough foreign reserves to finance a limited period of food and essential imports and dependent on the IMF for financing, neglected infrastructure development during decades of misrule under Mubarak- a candidate with an advanced engineering background trained in the U.S. could bring the right set of skills to the job of rebuilding Egypt. ...

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Sweden's Foreign Minister Maria Stengard says Swedish analysis Russia's economy is much weaker than official estimates show. She says one should not underestimate Russia, as well as not make the mistake of overestimating Russia. It shows Russian central bank interest rates set at 21% in 2024 when interest rates were 10%, suggesting that inflation was much higher than the 5% official figures. The minister also points out that instead of growing by 13% as official figures reported Russian economy had declined by 8% over 2020 to 2024. British government estimate is that the losses from the Ukraine war are $450 billion. Official growth estimate for 2026 is 0.4%, even with higher oil prices. About 1.2 million men were lost in the war in Ukraine, and this affects Russia's productive part of the economy.  A new package of $106 billion has been approved for Ukraine by the European Union. EU stands with Ukraine. Stengard says Russian elites are in favor of ending the war before it does serious irreversible damage to the economy. This is also shown in the article on Russian economic conditions in the NYT today by Russia's Mikhail Zygar with Putin about to make changes and end the war in January 2024 to reverse the downward course in the economy after over 3 years of war since Feb 24, 2022. Not much is changing on the battlefield as both sides are at an impasse. So that continuing the war makes little sense for the two countries and a pullback, geting to a peace agreement, open minded negotiations, makes real sense. ...

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 President DJT has several options after SC Tariffs decision -Sections 122 Trade Act of 1972 has 150 day limit and 15% maximum tariff rate, and Sections 232 and 301 of the Trade Expansion Act of 1962 is specifically designed for China and countries with high trade deficits. DJT pointed out at the press conference following the Supreme Court decision pointed out that he had these options at the beginning in April for tariffs. He chose IEEPA instead because the other options required work that would take several months showing the unfair treatment of the US by other nations. It is likely that the president used IEEPA for speed yet kept open the options to replace it with the option that would work best. The new studies will have been started much earlier in 2025 so that the president can introduce all his tariffs under new arrangements. Another aspect of this is that the president has negotiated Free Trade Agreements with most of the nations that are large trade partners from India, China, Vietnam, South Korea, Japan to UK, EU, Germany, France with the idea of boosting the US economy with tariffs of 10-15%. ...

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Global aid to agriculture in developing countries is about $5 billion a year. Mr Obama made the decision to double U.S> aid to developing countries farmers to more than $1 billion ayear in 2010. THe NYT reports that with the G8 meeting in Italy in July, America will spend $3.5 billion dollars over 3 years for helping farmers in developing countries. This according to Michael Fromans, an Obama adminsitration official is going to be new money. As far as the other G8 countries are concerned it could include old money for the total $15 billion committed. Since the worst hit areas for agriculture are in Africa, and Africa has lost a lot of ground in development in the last 20 years, suffering neglect in aid to farmers over 20 years both form the American administrations and their own governments, it is surprising that the amount and the details for where it would go in Africa are not revealed. Mr Obama has grasped the need not just for shipping food assistance from the USA, but need to help farmers. He agrees with ANdrew Natsios former head of Agency of International Development, who says that most of the poorest people in developing countries are farmers and herders living in the countryside, the crux of any effort to improve their lives has to start with agriculture. Obama advocates using the "tried and true agricultural methodfs and technologies that are cheap and are efficient but can have huge impact" in the lives of people. Malawi, is a good example, say Prof. Sachs of Columbia University, as subsidies for fertilizer sharply increased food production. Sachs says it is possible to double or triple food production by giving small-holder farmers access to high yielding seeds, fertilizer and agricultural extension services. But more needs to be done and devloping countries themselves that have made progress like India, China and Brazil can provide their know-how and experts and should have been brought into this, which is another reason why there is no reason for a G-8 summit of countries of European origin. An enlarged organization can bring in the resources and ideas of all the major countries in the world, to especially bear in on Africa, where alot needs to be done. Just to get an idea the UN's Food and Agriculture Organization says the global economic crisis will put another 100 million people into facing hunger this year....

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Shamil Shams interview with Shakuntala Banaji, expert on media and communication at the London School of Economics, on the general election in Britain. Banaji says there has been persistent negative coverage given to Jeremy Corbyn of the Labor Party for the last two years. A lot of hard work has been done by Labor MP's, Labor activists, volunteers, to get the Labor message across. Corbyn is seen as giving a calm composed performance in the face of hostile media and audience, including the televised interview in which he talked of real issues facing ordinary British people. One of the ways Corbyn has softened the media distorted image of him is by acting calmly under pressure and not taking on an autocratic style. This was best seen on the day he first handed out the Labor party manifesto with the focus on the message- for the many, not the few. Some of the coverage of Corbyn is described here as being improper and unacceptable.

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The Trump administration proposes a zero policy for Iranian oil imports which says the U.S. will grant zero exemptions to countries importing Iranian oil.  Big importers China and India are likely to resist this policy.