LyrArc Article Gist
An assessment of progress in free trade and generating jobs in N. America under the NAFTA agreement between the U.S., Canada and Mexico. The agreement was signed under President Clinton in 1994. NAFTA removed existing tariffs on over half of the exports from Mexico to the U.S. and phased out remaining tariffs between the U.S., Canada and Mexico. The U.S. had two way trade of $918 billion with Canada and Mexico in 2010, according to the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative. Canada is the U.S.'s top trading partner, with $462 billion in trade through Sept. 2012, and U.S. trade with Mexico- expected to overtake China- is at $369 billion in the same 9 month period of 2012.

LyrArc Article Gist
That social media is likened to cigarettes and Joanna Stern gives this WSJ video titled  "Facebook and Big Tobacco: Why Social Media is (and isn't) like Cigarettes" itself tells a lot about the way the public in the US perceives the dangers of social media. Social media regulation is compared to the experience with tobacco regulation in the US in this WSJ report. Senators Amy Kobluchar, Democrat of Minnesota and Chuck Grassley Republican of Iowa lead the effort for regulation in the US Senate in the face of lobbying millions spent by so-called tech companies. Tech in history goes back to the period following the Renaissance in Europe when hundreds of scientific discoveries changed the way we live and work with advances in medicine, science, manufacturing, infrastructure, rail, flight, and computers  whereas the tech of tech companies such as Google and Facebook, Amazon, and Apple is around for 15-20 years, and built on the hundreds of years of innovation coming before, and now degenerated into monopolistic profit seeking. With negative consequences for women, children, and which violate basic ideas of fairness on which America is built.  ...

LyrArc Article Gist
A 60% turnout in the election in Kashmir with the National Conference Party under Omar Abdullah winning 28 seats out of 87 seats, and the People's Democratic Party winning 21 seats and the Congress Party winning 17 seats. A coalition between the Congress party and the National Conference party is expected. The turnout in Srinagar the main city was 20%, higher than the 5% in 2002, which suggests that the terrorism in Kashmir is focussed in areas like Srinagar and in the rest of the country including rural districts the people are looking for ways to improve their lives free of the violence and poverty resulting from the insurgency.

LyrArc Article Gist
John Holmes the UN deputy secretary general and relief coordinator says after a 4 day situation that the situation in Afghanistan is deteriorating. Afghanistan's food needs he says are very great considering the worsening food situation cause by world food prices surging and by the loss of about 40% of Afghanistan's wheat crop from drought that has affected food producing areas. The UN appealed 6 months earlier for $400 million in food aid to meet the needs of 4.5 million people or 14% of the people and for seeds and fertilizer to increase food production. Complicating food delivery is the worsening security situation with 432 deaths to insurgent attacks, and 62% rise in civilian deaths, displacement of 160,000 people.

LyrArc Article Gist
Musharraf's efforts at economic growth were not broad enough or deep enough to create a measurable difference in the lives of the Pakistani people. And improvements in industry and agriculture may have been shallow compared to the potential. The wars or conflicts one or the other with India and the failure of political leaders may have been too big a distraction to achieve the significant effort needed to make a serious improvement in the lives of ordinary people and grow the middle class. Inflation is up by 24% year to year in July and rising, which is really an intolerable burden in a poor developing country. Now what little progress was made in Pakistan for the lives of ordinary people and the middle class is unraveling in the face of increase in the price of food, and fuel. And the the fall in the value of the Pakistan ruppee to Rs 75 for one American dollar, a 24% decline in value since January 2008 in only 8 months, shows a serious loss of confidence in the economy. The fall in the foreign exchange reserves is striking from $16 billion in November to $9.92 billion at this time. Pakistan appears to be heading in the direction of a serious refocussing of its economy, its politics, its educational institutions, and government and private industry, and its military in the direction of improving the lives of ordinary people, building industry and agriculture and building its infrastructure. If left unattended this crisis can only get worse and none of the past experience the old military approaches, the religious politics, the corruption in politics, the old political slogans, the conflict building with India, is going to be of much help in tackling the real day to day problems of improvement in industry, agriculture, infrastructure, and building better lives....

LyrArc Article Gist
US National Intelligence report due after the November elections confirms much of the British Ambassador's cable to the French from Afghanistan. Its a situation in a downward spiral the draft report says and the deterioration is accelerated by rampant corruption and the heroin trade which is now about half of Afghanistan's economy. The government "has lost all trust" according to the British Ambassador Cowper-Coles report.

LyrArc Article Gist
Is Ahmadinejad or Khamanei Iran's socalled supreme leader, the leader foreign leaders should be paying attention to in the final analysis? The openings in the Clinton administration under Khatami for a reconciliation of differences, Irans legitimate interests and aspirations in the shiite and Islamic world and how they can be reconciled with the American interests as in Iraq. How rhetoric of Ahmadinejad may have poisoned these possibilities and clouded the real nature of Iran as not a totalitarian state says Akbar Ganji but more of a Sultanate in the Islamic tradition with a heterogenity of views and interests under an Islamic banner and authority, as for instance liberalism, socialism and feminism all views that exist as currents in Iranian society and vie to replace the existing Islamic ideology or to supplement or modify it in a form of modernizing element. And in the final analysis its about the hope of democracy activists in Iran and activists for modernizing element, and moderating influences in Iran's heterogenous society and in its bazaars that emphasize commercial instincts and manner over ideology, which also have popular support as they did under Khatami, to come up with a government that is more likely to work with a range of countries from China and India in Asia to Europe and the United States. And its about how the US and Europe can work towards that outcome requiring less rhetoric and more patience, firmness, and perseverence. ...

LyrArc Article Gist
Admiral Mullen chairma joint cheifs confirms most of what the British Ambassador in Afghanistan s saying about deteriorating prospects in the country. He understands the heroin growing issue brought up by US counter narcotics experts in the NYT recently, by saying "we've got to impact pretty significantly, pretty fast on the poppy issue". He is aware that poppy growing is abundant in the south and in Helmand province pours upwards of $100 million to finance the Taliban. General McKiernan who heads NATO forces there says that NATO forces would be authorized to attack narcotics bosses, their soldiers and infrastructure, if they are linked to movement of weapons, improvised explosives or foreign fighters in Afghanistan. Which is possibly a waiting mode till more troops are sent to Afghanistan as policing this rugged mountanous country with tribal regions and loyalties complicated by the narcotics layer and widespread corruption in the Karzai government and its loss of popular support requires many more troops than are now in the country and a sustained campaign. So far the US and European forces possibly outnumbered have resisted alienating the poppy farmers in the south through land based eradication. But with more troops Mullen's new approach and Petraeus's has to shift to something like that, at the same time as they follow Petraeus's new counterinsurgency doctrine in display in Iraq to draw down the Taliban strength to its core supporters by winning other tribal factions with no hardcore loyalties over to the American side....

LyrArc Article Gist
Tranlation of an oped article in French on the Lashkar -e Taiba terrorist group in Pakistan, and its links and sponsors in the Pakistan ISI agency which is itself a state within a state.

LyrArc Article Gist
India's response says Amitav Ghosh is better being like the Spanish response to the Madrid bombings 11-M as it is known in Spanish, than the American response to 9/11. The American response was military buildup and the invasion of Afgahnistan and then Iraq. The Spanish response was says Ghosh was of vigilance, patience and careful police work in coordination with neighboring countries. And in the case of India the added effort to eliminate the terrorists hideouts and safe houses in cooperatation with other countries. Tightened security in all areas and bringing it on par with the security in countries that have addressed the challenge at a much better level.

LyrArc Article Gist
A year long study by the Washington Post of all shootings by the the police in incidents of law enforcement in the U.S. shows only about 4% of the incidents involve police killing unarmed black persons. Yet a disproprotionate number of unarmed men shot are black or Hispanic- 3 of 5 people. The large majority of incidents involved people who were mentally troubled most of whom carried a weapon, persons carrying a weapon, or persons running from the police when asked to stop. The WP has compiled every police shooting in its database for analysis, something even the FBI does not have and is only now starting to put together. For police the hard part is when to know a certain behaviour such as reaching into the pocket after a police chase was harmless or risking the officer's life, as shown in a video carried by officer Lisa Mearkle in Hummelstown, Pennsylvania, for one of the shootings. Mearkle was acquitted by the jury.

LyrArc Article Gist
Large food and beverage companies are seeing established brands sales decline as newer organic and health conscious brands increase market share. The 25 largest food company sales declined to 45.1% of food industry sales of $418 billion in 2014, declining by 4.3% since 2009. Smaller brands increased share from 32.1% to 35.3%. The more health conscious brands have seen tremendous growth, Granola bar company KindLLC increased share from 0.5% share of the snack bar market to about 6% in 2015, according to Bernstein Research. Chobani Inc. reached $1 billion in sales in 5 years. Kroger and other big supermarket chains are responding to consumer demand for buying local, buying from boutique producers, and buying from health conscious producers, by supporting these brands with marketing strategy, flavor selection, package size, and other ways, so that Kroger can carry their products on its shelves. FlapJacked pancake mix from a small Colorado company was introduced at Kroger's King Soopers chain in that state, and then taken to 500 Kroger stores in the U.S. For chains such as Kroger and Winn-Dixie in the southern U.S., it is critical to stay ahead of changing consumer preferences, especially now that eating right and eating healthy, and looking for alternatives, is changing the marketplace. ...

LyrArc Article Gist
According to a senior defense industry official Defense Secretary Robert Gates worries that counterinsurgency may not work in Afghanistan. According to the official even 40,000 troops would not give enough troop on the ground to protect the Afghns if the north and west continue to deteriorate. Gates is concerned about sending large amounts of additional US troops to Afghnistan. This is acountry with people very sensitive to occupying powers. A veteran of the soviet intervention there says they have an allergy to foreigners and attributes the soviet defeat to this. See the links in Intelilinks He is aware of the the dangers of this, if the expanded military footprint is seen as that of an occupying power especially when the government in Kabul is hugely unpopular, then this would galvanize new armed opposition to the US and draw US forces and NATO forces into aguerilla war of the type the soviet union faced there. It may do much worse if it galvanizes opposition in side Pakistan. The question Obama is focussing on is whether there is athreat to the US homeland security if other options than expanding troop strength are explored....

LyrArc Article Gist
El-Erian points to the risks posed by the long term unemployed in the U.S. He cites the 43.9% of the unemployed or 5.5 millon people out of work for 27 weeks or more. In fact the U-6 measure for unemployment that includes the people who have quit looking for work and parttime workers is abetter indication of where things are. This was an estimated 11% in November 2011, according to Ed Luce in the Financial Times, cited by Klein in the Washington Post.

LyrArc Article Gist
One US military official says that there is very little respect and regard for each other between General McChrystal and Vice President Biden, going so far as to say that both men hate each other's guts. Personal strains, and the difficulties in Afghanistan compound the differences.

LyrArc Article Gist
France's union and business representatives reach agreement on improving competitiveness by providing new flexibility in labor rules. Unions agreed to cooperate with business in ways similiar to the German "kurzarbeit" program where workers work shorter hours but are guaranteed employment when demand is down. Workers on temporary contracts get health care benefits and incentives are given for businesses to take on more permanent employees.

LyrArc Article Gist
A report published by Capital Economics of Toronto, based on Labor Department data, shows the U.S. is not adding the kinds of jobs with the pay, benefits and hours of the 8.75 million jobs that disappeared during the recession. Labor Department data support this analysis. The number of food preparation and serving workers are expected to grow by 394,000 by 2018, but the pay is only $16,430 for these jobs. The good well paying jobs are continuing to be lost. Large employers such as Lowe's home improvement chain is eliminating 1700 managers, and adding 10,000 weekend sales positions and new assistant store manager positions. This use of parttime workers also reduces income levels of workers. The impact of this is to limit the consumer spending. As local government is shrinking from budget cuts, better paying jobs are being lost in state and local government, and workers are earning less in the new jobs that do similiar work.

LyrArc Article Gist
This article in Zeit Online tries to provide the facts behind Merkel's decision made in a period of 24-48 hours to let refugees marching towards Austria from Keleti station in Budapest, Hungary, September 5, 2015, to enter Germany. Other reports pointed out that too little time was given to make the decision and that it was purely done on humanitarian terms. And made during that short window of time, in which a decision had to be made to turn away the refugees going on foot for hundreds of miles or to turn them away. Given Germany's earlier history the choice was a difficult one but erred on the side of being humanitarian. Though Merkel's selfie with a refugee at a hostel on Sept 10, would seem to suggest otherwise, Merkel has said her decision was made with so little time and little opportunity to understand all the ramifications of this. It was not an open invitation to refugees to come to Germany. 

LyrArc Article Gist
Perceptions of Chinese Communist Party leader Xi Jinping in China. The image of Jinping as one who stands up for ordinary Chinese and opposes corrupt officials is promoted in Chinese media. His visit to a small fast food place in Beijing, the Qingfeng Steamed Bun Shop, where he paid for the food, and took it to a folding table, is shown repeatedly on Chinese media. The cult of personality did not appeal to Communist leader Deng Xiaoping following two decades of a personality cult for leader Mao created by incessant propaganda. Under Hu Jintao, Jinping's predecessor the effacement was complete with the leadership taking a very low profile, and emphasizing scientific progress and technological development under a system setup by Deng's successor, Zemin, a former mayor of Shanghai. Some aspects of the old Mao era depiction of a strong leader who cared about China's interests above all else and was with the ordinary people, farmers, workers and students, is being revived today. It fits Xi Jinping's profile of a leader who spent time in the countryside with farmers, which happened when he was assigned at the age of 15 to Shanxi province during the Cultural Revolution period of the late 1960's- what Harvard professor Elizabeth Perry calls his adolescent socialization period- and his views of the positive role played by the Communist party, inspite of the excesses of the Party and the persecution suffered under Mao by Jinping's father when he fell out of favor. The link to Jinping's Hebei province shows the difficulties suffered of growing up during the Cultural Revolution, and his personal struggles including efforts to get into Tsinghua University as his father fell out of favor with Mao. As a result Xi has a inbuilt wariness for political positions. The story shows considerable ironies as Xi's father, a revolutionary war veteran from Hebei province, fell out of favor first with Mao and for a second time for criticism of Deng's crackdown at Tienanmen Square. Just to survive and grow during so many changes from the fifties China to the twenty first century China, shows remarkable resilience and strength, which is why Singapore's leader Lee Juan Yew sees much emotional stability in Xi Jinping. Is the personality building effort a Communist Party propaganda version of the careful nurturing of image done in western media for favored persons, or a revival of an older Mao type personality building effort? Xi's own wariness suggests it may be the former with some aspects from China's own past, as he promotes the Communist Party's claim to lead China for another generation by reducing corruption and furthering technological progress....

LyrArc Article Gist
Monica Langley provides an excellent account of how U.S. Education Secretary, Arne Duncan, is using the $100 billion from the Stimulus funds in the 2009 Recovery Act to implement the Common Core education program in U.S. states and districts. Common Core is about raising student math and reading scores and standards, and implementing teacher evaluations based on test scores to make teachers accountable. This is the one significant area in which the Obama administraton in the U.S. is likely to leave a valuable legacy. Republicans in Tennessee, including Lamar Alexander, have embraced the program, showing how Duncan is using his persuasion skills to speed up the implementation across political party lines in a period of strong partisan feelings about programs. When governors have hesitated, Duncan has gone straight to the school districts using the funding. Teachers union say the program is moving too fast as evaluations would affect teacher careers, and Duncan agreed to a one year reprieve on the consequences of new teacher evaluations for states applying for an extension. This makes Duncan uncomfortable. He says he has only three and a half years left and he is going tooo slow. Business leaders such as P&G CEO, Robert McDonald, say the only political party they have is their educated workforce. Duncan has persuaded 40 states in the U.S. to sign up for higher standards in reading and math. Democrats see the Duncan initiative as helping poorer schools, which is also important to reduce the increasing inequality in the U.S. Since 2008 high school graduation rates increased by 3 percentage points, with a 5 point gain for black students and a 7 point gain for Hispanic students. After $4 billon in new funding to low performing schools, so called "dropout factories," the number of such schools has declined to 1424 from 1746. Teachers unions are only gradually adjusting to the need for accountability in math and reading scores. Duncan's father was a psychology professor at the University of Chicago, and Duncan grew up in Chicago neighborhoods before attending Harvard and playing for the basketball team. Duncan tutored younger school students in the afternoon at his mother's after school program in a black neighborhood on the South Side of Chicago. In 2001 he was made the head of the Chicago public school system by Mayor Daley, where he took action to shut down poorly performing schools and reopening them with new staff. All the time he pushed for greater parental choice, charter schools, new teacher talent and using data to track school and student performance. ...

LyrArc Article Gist
Al Maktoum is prime minister of Dubai. He points out some important facts about the Arab world. About half of the 300 million people in the Arab world are under the age of 25. Unemploment is very high among these 150 million Arab youth. About 50% of the jobless are youth, according to the prime minister. About 65 million of the Arabs are illiterate, and 10 million children under the age of 25 are not enrolled in any school. He points out that with so little education, the Arab youth are especially vulnerable to propaganda that creates extremism and is hostile to the west and the USA. One of his key points is that the Arab world is the most militarized place in the world, and spending on conflicts in the Middle East in the last 60 years is about $3 trillion. And in the last 15 years he says the spending on education which is 20% of what the world's 30 wealthiest countries spend, has dropped to 10% of that amount. And very little is being done to educate girls and give them opportunities. As a result of these convictions, Al Maktoum, who is also the ruler of Dubai and from the royal family, has committed about $3 billion to various initiatives to provide schooling to children, especially girls, and education for young people. This makes him one of the more enlightened leaders in the region pushing for new directions. This also reveals the critical weakness among the Arab peoples and why they tend to be so radicalized. Improvements in education and more opportunities for jobless youth, and creating a peaceful region -with the US and the EU countries committing to policies that lead to much diminished military sales to Mideast countries and reducing hostilities in the region -would do more to reduce anti-American sentiment in the region and improve US security than any other policy actions. As Iran, Pakistan and Afghanistan, and the Muslims of India share the same characteristics as the Arab peoples, and the same cultures, the same is true of this region, actually more so. Education has been even worse neglected in the South Asian Muslim region than among the Arabs. It is the key to peace, does more than troops to ensure the peace. The need is for more schools to be built and run in the region, for essential services like healthcare and development, and financing of job creating industries. ...

LyrArc Article Gist
A delicate balancing act for the Federal Reserve, in not withdrawing support to the debt securitization markets in a manner that throws the economy off balance, and leads to the collapse of credit markets still again. Lee Sachs, an advisor to Timothy Geithner, Treasury secretary, says that its important to do it incrementally, where and when you think you can, and not sooner. The debt securitization markets act as a shadow banking system, they finance mortgages for homes, corporate loans, student loans, credit card debt. Before the debt crisis in 2008, banks made loans for mortgages, and then sold these loans packaged into securities in the debt securtization markets. 60% of American credit has in recent years come from this process of debt securitization. This is how the markets look at this time in September 2009. 1. A thriving private market in securities packaged out of home mortgages, collapsed from $744 billion in 2005 at the peak, to $8 billion during first half 2009. THe Fed is almost the only buyer of mortgage backed securities, with $905 billion of these government guaranteed securities purchased through mid September, 80-85% of the market. 2. The market for bonds backed by consumer debt - credit card debt, auto loans and student loans - has recovered to before the crisis. But this is only because of the government's Term Asset Backed Securities Loan Facility or TALF, which provides attractive government financing to buyers. Hyun Song Shin, a Princeton University economist, who is an expert in this area, says the big question is what happens without TALF, can the market stand on its own two feet or is it permanently hobbled. 3. The market for securities in commercial real estate loans has not seen any securties issued in two years. Overall says Robert Shiller, a Yale University economist, the security markets are dead, we are stuck in a situation where no one knows what will happen when the government gets out of these markets. The Fed will continue to support the mortgage markets till it goes from the $905 billion now to $1.25 trillion. At that point it will have to make some tough decisions, and banks are not lending, making it tougher for business. On top of this banks liquidity requirements are being increased after the G20 agreement, and Britain's FSA has already taken the initiative on this. And a further $50 billion in corporate real estate securities are to be refinanced in 2010, says CALPERS, Arnold Phillips. If there is no mechanism to address support here, these properties will default, leading to bank losses and even tighter credit. ...