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The focus is shifting from the oil majors to the companies in the oil field services sector, companies that supply the oil companies with oil field services. Deepwater oil field drilling rigs some of the most modern computer controlled ones run $650 million are in great demand and one Norwegian supplier of drilling rigs has anticipated the demand for advanced deepwater drilling rigs which the major oil companies had not invested in and is now in a position to charge $600,000 a day for the advanced rigs he has ordered 3 years ago as the deepwater drilling took off in places like offshore Angola. Earlier this Norwegian had anticipated the shift to long haul shipping of oil to places like India and China from Iran and offshore Africa.

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Rapid growth in SUV sales in China in 2011-2014. SUV sales increased by 49% in 2013 over 2012.

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In Spain it is not the big banks like Banco Santander or BBVA that funneled a lot of the mortgage lending. Its the Cajas or non profit lending instituions that do more than half of all the loans. The Cajas had $330 billion in loans to developers in Sept. 2009, up from $50 billion in 2000. As home prices plunge the 45 Cajas are suffering losses, amounting to estimated $3.4 billion in 2010.

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BBC says this England team is fighting to avoid the worst Ashes cricket performance in a century. England lost the Second Test at the Gabba in Brisbane by 8 wickets- again. Mitchell Starc with 6 wickets for 75 runs in the first innings and batting in second innings for 77 runs was agains the key player in Brisbane. Neser with 5 wickets for 42 runs for Australia in the second innings reduced England's chances.

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Epidemiologist Marc Lipsitch of the Harvard School of Public Health says in Jan 2018 issue of Harvard Chan Institute of Public Health journal that an "accidental pandemic" could result from the lifting of the ban on a risky kind of research favored by some virologist professionals.  In "Three Questions, Three Answers" Lipsitch tells why. Most members of the broader scientific and medical community had serious questions and were fiercely against such research which had questionable value and great risk. At the beginning the interviewer Karen Feldscher writes:  "January 8, 2018- Last month the US government lifted a three year moratorium on funding risky research to genetically alter deadly viruses in ways that could make them even more lethal. Epidemiologist Marc Lipsitch of Harvard Chan School thinks the move could create an accidental pandemic." Lipsitch says rejecting the virologists who supported this dangerous research: "Others, like myself, worry that the human error could lead to the accidental release of a virus that has been enhanced in the lab so that it is more deadly and contagious than it already is." He cites an accident in 2014 at US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Lab where workers were exposed to anthrax that was improperly handled. "Another accident like that- if it involved a virus that was both newly created and highly contagious- has the potential to jeopardize millions of people."  Lipsitch points out that this kind of research has given us modest scientific knowledge, was not essential to tackling the virus epidemics, was only one type of many types of research, and a type of research whose aims could be achieved in other ways that were not deadly to humans. Lipsitch pointed this out in The Journal of Medical Ethics stating the ethical considerations at stake. The lifting of the ban led to research at labs that is seen as a possible scenario of what happened to cause an accidental pandemic. The people of the world, and not just in America but the people of the whole world, and the poorest countries with little resources- Asia, Africa, Latin America bearing the consequences of this decision that violated medical ethical considerations of setting up a potential accidental pandemic.   ...

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Indian PM Modi will take part in the swearing in of a new government in Maharashtra on December 5, 2024. Maharashtra and Gujarat with cities Mumbai and Ahmedabad were part of Bombay state in 1947 after independence. It was also the largest trade and industrial region of India. Today it is poised under the Modi government to deliver industrialization on a scale that matches that of China for a modern Vikshit Bharat over the next decade and to 2040. This is the real significance of this event which in some ways surpasses the US election in significance and the scale of transformation of the largest nation in the world.

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The broad leeway for vaccination in the Pacific Northwest of the U.S. is leading to the outbreak of a disease that was seen as wiped out twenty years ago. A measles outbreak has taken place in Washington state. 50 cases are reported from this area according to CDC.

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Colombia's GDP is $350 billion, in 2025 Venezuela's is $50 billion. Socialism under Chavez imitating Simon Bolivar as shown here starts out well with more housing, health care reaching poorer neighborhoods and parts of the population that were ignored. But only till 2011 in the early years. As mismanagement, corrupt cronies take over the nationalized enterprises, petroleum company fails to invest, and mismanagement of the economy sets in, educated classes leave the country in the class warfare, the results are disastrous. As much as 20-30% of the population leaves, hyperinflation, bad relations with the US, leading to the worst humanitarian disaster in the American continent since 1900.  It shows that the educated classes of every nation bear a major responsibility to  create a healthier society at the beginning so that the glimmers of hope of free services lead to the wrong people ending up in power and mismanagement on a massive scale destroying everything. New York City's educated classes should shoulder the responsibilities that people like Felix Rohatyn as head of MAC describes in his book- Bold Endeavors, that is the true spirit of the Nation (2009). ...

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A proposal by U.S president Obama to increase the minimum wage to $9.00 per hour from $7.25 to reduce poverty and inequality. This was announced in the State of the Union address of 2013.

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The situation for the day before the Iowa caucuses on Feb. 1, 2016, with voter turnout playing a key part in the election primary.

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Rebuilding in Ukraine is focused on destroyed bridges and infrastructure as Russia continues to destroy apartment blocks, and targets the electricity grid.  Many of the apartment blocks destroyed outside Kviv in Irpin in this story are hard to rebuild because of the constant attacks most recently with hypersonic missiles that are hard to detect. A couple fled from Donetsk, settled in Irpin in a new apartment only to have to flee again after a Russian missile attack left their apartment building in ruins. How do you build in the midst of a war is the question Ukrainians ask themselves every day. About 150,000 apartment buildings and half the electricity grid is destroyed, so also 1500 schools and 20,000 kilometres of roads. It would cost $350 billion to repair. It would require policy decisions on what quality of building materials and how many to apartment buildings to build and how quickly.

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Softbank, Japan's leading search engine company, has a 34% stake in Alibaba. It also persuaded Alibaba's founder Jack Ma to start e-commerce site Taobao. Softbank will start a service in 2010 which connects Taobao to its Tahoo portal in Japan. Softbank owns a 35% stake in Oak Pacific Interactive which owns the popular social networking and game playing sites RenRen and Kaixin.com. Softbank's strategy in China is to concentrate on e-commerce, local social networking sites and online games. This avoids hitting a wall of government censorship which has hampered progres in China for Google and a number of other sites. Other steps taken by Softbank's founder are to work with respected local partners. Jack Ma sits on Softbank's board and Son sits on Alibaba's board. Softbank sees its mobile business connected to internet growth because mobile users are increasingly using the internet, and Softbank is a mobile carrier.

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Classic DJT letter to Japan. WSJ annotates the letter but its annotation does not say that Japan has used the relationship with the US to its advantage, putting the US companies and industries at a serious disadvantage since 1970's. US Trade Representative under DJT first term 2016-2020 was Robert Lighthizer. Lighthizer was Deputy Trade Representative under Reagan in the 1980's negotiating with a Japan that would concede little. 2024 USTR Jamieson Greer was Deputy Trade Representative under Lighthizer. The Letter starts setting the tone that we have borne Japan's unwillingness to negotiate fairly with patience, ends stating we are ready to act. "It is a Great Honor for me to send you this letter in that it demonstrates the strength and commitment of our Trading Relationship, and the fact that the United States of America has agreed to continue working with Japan, despite having a significant Trade Deficit with your great Country." "We have had years to discuss our Trading Relationship with Japan, and have concluded that we must move away ....Our relationship has been, unfortunately, far from Reciprocal...Goods transshipped to evade a higher Tariff....If for any reason you decide to raise your Tariffs..." ...

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"The Manual of Parliamentary Practice" by Thomas Jefferson, first published in 1826, sets the practice of providing Congress the negotiating records for a treaty including correspondence, as a normal "usage for the Executive." This creates public confidence through the necessary transparency and openness.

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Goldman Sachs which spent $2.8 million last year on Washington lobbyists to get favorable treatment from lawmakers is increasingly having ahard time getting attention in Congress.

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Greg Mortenson runs 78 schools in remote poor areas of Afghanistan and Pakistan on a budget of $2.8 millioon he raises through small donations to his foundation, the Central Asia Institute. The Pentagon is listening to Mortenson and he has met privately with Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. THe military has specially sought him out. And General Petraeus has read his book Three Cups of Tea and passed it on to his staff for reading. He also has been asked to speak with senior officers of the Special Operations Command. Greg Mortenson believes getting amoderate education for these children is the best way to prevent the spread of Islamic extremism. In addition to the 78 schools he also runs 48 other schools in refugee camps in the region and 28,000 children in the 2 countries attend Mortenson's schools. In atalk to the Pentagon uniformed officers in 2002 he told them that the $840,000 spent on each of the Tomahawk cruise missiles fired into Afghanistan could have been used to build dozens of schools. He asked them which would you think will make us more secure? ...

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Adam Bryant talks to 4 women executives about the problems women face in taking up higher management positions. One of the problems addressed directly and at length by the head of Pfizer Nutrition, Amy Schulman, is what she calls "the dutiful daughter," doing what is expected of you. This is also described as a serious problem for women executives in Asia by Riva Gold, where women not having 100% of the skills for a higher management job will step back, whereas men with only 50% of the skills step forward. Schulman says women have to be well prepared and have a good grasp of the subject matter, have acquired experience, and having done that they need to make their voice heard. Any anxieties about not getting it just right, or asking the question about whether "she belongs" need to be left behind. The leaders of companies need to create the environment in which biases and assumptions about women in the workplace do not hinder getting a mix of different voices in the corporation, which can only benefit from that diversity of people and styles. Another point she makes is that women have to spend their political capital, to stand up for colleagues and the team where appropriate, for principles that are significant, to be build credibility and win credit. ...

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The dangers of a population explosion in Nigeria, as infrastructure is woefully falling behind and creating failing living conditions.

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Vauban is a "car- free" upscale communitynear Freiburg, Germany, close to the German-Swiss border. Except for the main street where atram to Freiburg runs, and two parking lots outside the community, there is no place to park cars. About 70% of the people there do not have cars and 57% sold their cars to come here. There are no car garages or parking places with each home. Bicycles are hte main means of transport. Vauban hasd 5500 residents in one square mile. The basic concept of having stores placed only awalk away is being followed more and more as America and Europe shifts away from intensive auto based use of space for living. The whole post war location of housing and stores and community activities was based on large use of the automobile. This is now going through big changes. David Goldberg, of Transportation of America says " how much you drive is as important as whether you have ahybrid." A fast growing coalition of hundreds of groups is advancing the cause of building communities with stores only a walk away and less need for the automobile to get around. Outside Hayward, California, Quarry Village is anew development that is trying to reduce autos to one per home. So car based is American culture that most zoning laws require 2 parking spaces per residential unit, and in the federal transportation bill 80% of appropriations in prior years used to go by law to highways and only 20% to other transport. This even though passenger cars are responsible for 12 percent of greenhouse emissions in Europe , and upto 50% in some car-intensive areas of the USA. One solution to the problem is to use smart planning to avoid the suburban sprawl, and shift to smaller more fuel efficient automobiles, and build better mass transit and rapid transit and fast rail linking most towns and cities, that will moderate all the excess that took place after the war. This may be the direction smart planning is taking us, and places like Vauban remaining niche communities for green advocates and a sort of reminder that its possible to go in this direction....