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If you love soccer or football you should see this interview by Frank Lampard of 2024 Ballon d'Or winner, Spanish player Rodri Fernandez. Rodri plays for Manchester City. The interesting thing about this Premier League You Tube video of Oct 29, 2024 is that British player Frank Lampard, and now coach, is he shows Rodri moments in each game on an iPad and asks him how he does it- the moves he makes as a midfielder on the field, including the picture in his head about the field in those moments.

Lampard does an excellent job showing Rodri at his best, the skills, the instinct, the preparation and the hard work, the discipline, and the extraordinary humility of Spanish footballers.

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Contrasting reviews of Maggie Smith in the Wash Post and the NYT. This one looks at her popularity outside Britain in the US in the kind of series about Britain Americans love- Downton Abbey about aristocratic life in Britain.

Mark Smith in the Post by contrast looks at her humor and her performances that have more meaning such as the one that got her noticed in Britain with the Academy Award for "The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie," about the Spanish Civil War and a teacher of impressionable girls, her admiration for fascism and her discovery of her moral blindness.

And also for her striking humor and wit in other performances. 

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DJT and Putin talk for 1 hour on February 12, 2025, on the phone and agree to hold talks to end the Ukraine War. He also talks to Zelensky of Ukraine following the talk with Putin. In this video DJT says he feels that Putin wants to end the war, Zelensky wants to end the war, and he wants to end the war. The talks will be continued on the phone, at a meeting in Saudi Arabia, and by visits of the two leaders to the US and to Russia. DJT says he agrees with Defense Secretary Hegseth that the war settlement will not include Ukraine joining as a member of NATO. The Munich Security Conference is Feb 14-16, 2025.

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Top 5 Things emails from junior and senior employees, from 30,000 employees of Nvidia, is how Jensen Huang stays on top of strategic direction for the AI company. Sunday night he gets such emails which tell about what is important to junior emplopyees that can geve Huang a feel for what is happening outside. He does not pay much attention to strategy meetings, tries to work in conference rooms with his ever present favorite marker. Jensen Huang is unlike anything seen in America's tech companies. 

Amazon's Jeff Bezos does not like tech presentations, he prefers a one page writeup that requires writing skills. Huang prefers emails that say briefly what junior employees are thinking.

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Peggy Noonan looks at Woodrow Wilson in 1919 when Mrs. Edith Boling Wilson assumed a key role for the president following Wilson's illness. She compares this to the last year of Reagan in office and the poor debate performance of president Biden. This is in sharp contrast to president Biden's active participation in political life and decisions he has made to protect Democrats work in office.  Biden saying that if he had to do this again he would have continued his run for the presidency in 2024 following the poor debate performance as he could have won the election. Biden also continues to lead the Democratic party as a former president who is actively involved in shaping the future.

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WSH recommends that Congress consolidate $100 billon of the $270 billion the Education Department gives out and send the money to the states without conditions on spending. Much of this money can then be used by states to improve reading comprehension and math skills which are woefully falling behind in the US. With each state taking on its own initiatives and other states copying the ones that have good results. This is better than one single approach coming out of the federal bureaucracy, that also has vested interests over time building around it, and which means America is deprived of the ingenuity and successful approaches that some states can achieve, and which can be then copied by other states.

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Boeing $50 billion new fighter jet program with profit guaranteed in the development stage. Boeing beat Lockheed to get the defense contract from the US government. In earlier defense contracts cost overruns led to Boeing losing money. Defense makes up a third of Boeing revenues. Boeing has reported six straight annual losses after problems with 737, a strike over wages, and safety problems on its planes, problems on the assembly line in quality control. The private equity type of management from finance executives has not worked well for Boeing as these executives lacked knowledge of what is happening on the manufacturing assembly lines. Boeing, a American icon for most of the twentieth century needs to get back to the basics of making good planes.

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Even after strong action on tariffs to level the playing field and taking other actions on immigration enforcement on April 25, 2025, US president DJT still has 45% approval rating down from 52% when taking office. Reaching tariff deals with many important nations over the next 3 months will increase DJT approval ratings. The stock markets are down about 10% after strong tariffs action which will take time to yield results by 2026. After many agreements are reached the face of world trade will have changed and manufacturing will be done in the US similar to its role in the mid 20th century, bringing with it jobs and higher wages and better communities for people to live in.

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Carter's work for Habitat for Humanity continued right up to 2019, five years before his death at 100 years. This report shows a picture of Carter and wife Rosalynn after he had 14 stitches from a fall at his home, still back to a Habitat for Humanity site in Nashville in 2019,  at 95 years of age. It shows Carter at sites in New York City in 1984, and the couple doing wood work at a site in 1992.

In addition to eradication of Guinea worm and other parasitic diseases in Africa Jimmy Carter lived a life right out of the Biblical teachings that he delivered at Sunday School at a local church in Georgia.

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Decisions by Judge Amit Mehta that affect not only current monopoly in Search engines but future AI monopoly in Search engines. Google is doing with Gemini AI by paying Samsung for AI Search what it did with earlier Search by paying Apple $20 billion to put its search engine on Apple's Safari browser.

Judge Amit Mehta could rule for divesting Chrome browser by Google and other actions to cease this monopoly that puts too much control in a democracy in one place, so that the ideas of Lincoln and the founders for thinking by the people, for the people, of the people in all its dimensions and varied manifestations does not perish from this earth.

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The US president has invoked emergency powers that relate to national security based on the fight against fentanyl -with 490,000 American lives lost over 12 years, 5 times that in the Vietnam and Korean Wars combined. And based on enormous trade imbalances that relate to national security with China having $1 trillion trade surplus 12 times the next highest trade surplus of $81 billion of Japan in 2007.

Note that appellate courts upheld the Nixon 10% trade tariffs based on invoking emergency powers also based on trade imbalances that time in the 1980's with Japan. The SCOTUS would be overreaching its judicial power to strike down the president on his main platform in the election, says one expert.

 

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Video presented by Gen. Dan Caine on how the Fordow site strike was done in real time. Dan Caine explains why the strikes were effective as Bombs Unit 57 were designed specifically for Fordow and the effort at Fordow is a project of the Threat Reduction Agency in the US War Department, doing this since 2009 when Fordow was being built.

Defense Secretary Hegseth points out that in the media's haste in reporting it had missed a key event at NATO meetings in The Hague, Netherlands. For the first time all EU nations had decided to shoulder their defense responsibilities for Europe. Germany and other nations will put 5% of the budget into defense of Europe.

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The U.S. Fed, America's central bank, barrs bank buyback of shares and limits dividend payouts to quarterly profit. The Fed does this as it warns banks they could sustain heavy losses of $700 billion for soured loans if the economy is slow to recover over several quarters, and unemployment remains high. The Fed's latest stress test for banks included the impact of the coronavirus epidemic. At this time the Fed says banks are healthy and this is protective action to keep the banks in safety.

Another sign of the changes taking place in finance and banking- swift action by the U.S. central bank leadership to stop early any potential improper behaviour of banks to do debt buybacks or dividend payout not meeting rules related to profit. 

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Going outdoors for sunlight which gives Vitamin D and getting exercize is becoming more important today with the coronavirus. Getting out to a park, green spaces or places to walk or run is increasingly important for maintaining good health after a long lockdown. Sunlight adds to our immune system and brings many benefits for mind and body as shown here.  

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Experts say the U.S. needs to continue waivers given to 8 countries for purchase of Iranian oil currently till April to avoid a price hike. The Trump administration banned purchase of oil from the Maduro government in Venezuela in late January. Iranian exports are at 1.1 million barrels a day down from 2.3 million barrels a day a year earlier.  

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A 850 megawatt solar project, the largest in the US outside of Las Vegas runs into opposition from environmentalists concerned about the effect on views and on tortoises other endangered species. The planned project on top of Mormon Mesa would put over 1 million solar panels 10 to 20 feet tall in the Nevada desert. Across the US 800 utility scale solar projects are under contract for generation of 70,000 megawatts of electricity, enough for 11 million homes, for more than Texas. Over half of this solar capacity is going into the southwestern US, with its sunshine and open land. For the first time the ardent advocates of renewable energy such as the Sierra Club are now opposing such projects. Solar made up one tenth of one percent of US energy in 2010, in 2020 it made up 4.5%. It is growing very rapidly because costs are going way down. Even before government subsidies solar is now below the cost of natural gas. Projects near Martha's Vineyard on the Massachusetts coast took 12 years to get sate and federal approval for wind energy. These battles are similar to ones being fought in Europe. The US is better positioned for solar because of vast desert spaces in the American southwest. President Joe Biden plans to use this advantage of solar and wind to get to 100% renewable energy by 2035. ...

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National Security Adviser Bolton says U.S. withdrawal from Syria depends on a number of factors, after president Trump qualified his earlier statement on withdrawal. 

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WSJ reports that the former president's supporters will rally to his side but swing voters might be repelled by this latest legal controversy including the context in which it happened that of a sordid affair. Mr. Trump built his support base out of two mistakes of president Obama, his neglect of rural America, and neglect of American manufacturing. And of the mistake of president Bush in pushing America into two wars in Afghanistan and Iraq that put money into wars with no productive purpose that needed to be put in rebuilding America's infrastructure. Others could have done this, Mr. Trump aggressively pushed ahead and found himself first. President Biden has closed the chapter on the wars by ending them, he has also closed the chapters of neglect of American manufacturing and put working families and America at the top of his agenda at every point. And as he did at the State of the Union address in 2023, made it personal by reciting what his father has told young Joe about standing up for working families. Biden's abilities rival that of president Lyndon Baines Johnson, who had as much experience in the US Congress as Biden, and delivered the passage of Medicare and Social Security for all Americans. Biden has done something that ranks similar with trillions of dollars for the Inflation Reduction Act, CHIPS and Science Act and pandemic assistance, and has the conviction that there is much more to be done. ...

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As the focus shifts to the east, the war in April in Ukraine shifts to a prolonged war. It also means that the focus now is also on economic separation of US and European economies from Russia and China. As it was this overdependence that lacked prudence or good sense, that emboldened Russia in its relations with the US and Europe, and China in its relations with neighbors in Asia. This report looks at the arms aid Ukraine may need to defend the region on its eastern border with Russia. Russia plans to focus on the separatist Luhansk and Donbas regions in the east which have sought closer ties with Russia. The war in the east has dragged on already for over 10 years.The rest of Ukraine and particularly western areas near Poland such as Lviv and areas near the Baltics have shown strong sentiment for an independent Ukraine able to choose her own path. Throughout history the Baltics and Poland have had a strong influence on western Ukraine and Russia on eastern Ukraine bordering Russia, with influence swinging one way or the other throughout Ukraine depending on the period in history. After the westernization and modernization of Russia under Peter the Great in the 17th century and of Prussia as a German state independent of the Hapsburgs in Vienna around the same period, geopolitics shifting the balance of power took on a bigger dimension. Putin's actions can only be seen as a throwback to using the tactics of invasion going back to this period in history from 1700 to 1950, when dominant powers France, Austria led by Hapsburg dynasty, and Britain with the Dutch fought wars seeking advantage mostly on territory of German states and Italian states, and in all parts of the world. This also laid the grounds for colonization of large parts of Asia and Africa by Europeans in this contest for dominance through trading companies that traded for profit, and used tax revenues from acquired lands for profit making and military activity. In some ways poor economic choices such as the excessive dependence of the US and European economies and their integration with China and Russia have led to the war. As they created advantages Russia and China did not have in technological capabilities and stronger economies that make war an alternative to support foreign policy goals. In the long term it is this these unsustainable economic choices that will be pulled back following the pandemic for shorter supply chains closer to home. This prudent economic separation could not have happened without recent events, as even now Germany industry says its dependence and integration with Russia is hard to reverse for gas supplies, and American business is only now making the changes away from dependence on China in its supply chain.   ...

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The growth of China's economy is likely to have a slight or no effect on growth in the US. Some estimates even show negative impact on the US if China's growth pushes up oil prices. Growth in China will come mainly from consumption spending and growth in services. This consumption spending may not not last beyond the first half of the year, according to one estimate. Even the more optimistic estimates such as Oxford Economics show the impact on global growth of growth in China of 5% to be not much more than 0.2%.

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The Hindu editorial on Nicola Sturgeon's resignation says she had taken controversial positions on using the next UK elections as a referendum for independence when the UK's Supreme Court ruled Westminster's agreement was needed for any referendum. The transgender issue comes at a time when the UK is suffering from a severe cost of living crisis, with the UK government of the Conservatives not doing as much as Germany and other EU countries to help people with the cost of living. Clearly Ms. Sturgeon failed to focus on the important issues for Scotland and the UK.

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Elon Musk and others who say MBA's are a problem for America. MBA training does not bring  the creativity and original ideas and doer approach America so desperately needs today. Asking Business school professors or lecturers about their opinion on MBA's does not make sense as this is how they earn their living. Musk is outspoken about this- "I think there is a MBA-ization of America, which I think is maybe not that great. There should be more focus on the product or service itself, less time on board meetings, less time on financials."