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The US military is finally, after years of being left out and over 300,000 young Americans losing their lives from fentanyl drugs being brought into the US- after Coast Guard is overwhelmed by the scale of activity- is finally now being enlisted in the effort to save lives and restore the integrity of America's borders. The deaths in this war are more than 3 times that in the Vietnam War and Korean War combined which were about 100,000. Yet ineffective political leaders have not responded with American strength in the face of the magnitude of losses. And ignored or neglected the firm basis on which president Monroe proclaimed the Monroe Doctrine to keep colonial powers out of this hemisphere. The result is that America and the youngest of its people America's most precious resource, have paid the price. America can do a better job of protecting the interests of the people of this hemisphere because of its great traditions of good government over several centuries going back even to the British days- it is America's solemn duty and responsibility to do so to the people of this hemisphere. ...

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With a lack of consensus about raising interest rates at the U.S. Federal Reserve, and inflation much lower than the 2% target rate, senior Fed officials and chairwoman Yellen see little need to raise rates at this time in September 2016.

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About 85% of people in Portugal a country of 10 million people are fully vaccinated in October 2021, highest in Europe. Strict precautions for prevention such as social distancing and mask remained in place after the surge in January 2021 which led to deaths at a rate that was three times the peak rate in the US.

On October 1, 2021 the restrictions such as 30% limit on filling soccer stadiums were lifted. For the Benefica vs Bayern Munich soccer game restrictions were lifted leading to filled stadiums with vaccination pass mandatory. As people return to indoors in winter this could still result in increase in cases. Because Portugal depends on tourism and stadiums are filled to capacity there is the risk of a smaller surge. Cruise ships are back in Portuguese ports and tourists,are back in large numbers. Soccer fans, fill subways, leading to new concern about a limited spread of the coronavirus.

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With misinformation and harassment online  during election year 2024 Annalena Baerbock, foreign minister of Germany, says "democracy did'nt fall from the sky. We have to protect it" Elections take place in Mexico, European Union, India, Britain and France, in 2024 as online media spreads misinformation. Baerbock says the yardstick of women's rights is a crucial one. If women are in danger it is a bad omen for society." Peter Limbourg of DW says "Even in dark times optimism is a better way to handle it. Because pessimists normally do not contribute to solutions." Hendrik Wurst stressed "the critical role of promoting media literacy in the digital age," something that is done through the efforts of Lyrarc.com by bringing in the best articles from leading media publications in the world on all topics to create educated informed mindsets that shape better lives and societies, and by keeping it open to all to access.

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The effort by prime minister Modi under Rozgar Mela to create 1 million new jobs in 2023 to mitigate the effect of the lockdowns during the pandemic and its effects on jobs. 71,000 new job appointment letters were given in a virtual event. Modi emphasized that "transparency in recruitment and promotion inspires confidence in the youth."  He called the process streamlined and time bound to demonstrate good governance.

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Boris Johnson says outside 10 Downing Street that it is time now to focus on the task ahead- to bring opportunity to every corner of the country, to do this by investing in the National Health Service, in schools, infrastructure and in public services. He calls for the healing to begin after five weeks of wrangling in the election campaign so that the whole country can come together. 

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Technology is reshaping the world of oil by 2018. The U.S. Permian Basin stretching from West Texas to New Mexico now produces more oil than the UAE and is likely to soon surpass Iran- production is at 3.1 million barrels a a day. There are as many rigs as in 2011 yet the production has tripled because of the use of high tech rigs that can move quickly to new locations over wide areas and with tech that can see hundreds of feet into the rock. By 2019 the U.S. will surpass Russia as the world's largest producer of oil. The drop in oil prices to about $40 a barrel in recent years is a result of Saudi efforts to block shale oil development by lowering prices. This has not worked. Initially some high cost producers exited the industry and the shale industry suffered. Over time the new technologies spurred by lower oil prices have led to the anticipated drop in cost. Shale oil can now be produced by core producers at $40 a barrel and still be profitable according to this WSJ report. All Middle Eastern countries cannot meet budget needs at $40 a barrel. In 2018 oil prices increased back up to $77 a barrel. In the next wave of declining prices the shale industry is better positioned than the OPEC countries.   ...

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France has reacted faster to the economic crisis presented by the pandemic. It shielded its economy earlier with government support and household consumption has held up better. Its presidential system led to faster decisions than Germany's decentralized mode leading to some experts saying it should borrow this aspect from France. France also has 70% of its energy from nuclear, Germany by contrast depended too long on Russia and Merkel's decision to completely get out of nuclear and to let overconcentration of supplies of energy from Russia happen was a mistake. Merkel also supported the auto industry without anticipating changes taking place after the Copenhagen Climate conference in 2009 and preparing for the future. The auto industry has taken a hit in Germany as it relies too much on imported EV batteries from China and was slow to make the transition to EV's and hybrids. In fairness to the SPD's Scholz and Greens Habeck considering the economy handed to them by Merkel they had to scramble after the Russian war in Ukraine in the middle of the pandemic. Germany made it through in record 1 year's time to be independent of Russian oil and gas, a huge achievement. Over time Germany will recover as it makes a transition of business away from overconcentration in China, another of Merkel's and German business failures to develop a vision for the future. China's slowdown has affected Germany. Germany has to invest in other parts of the world including in India and Japan to diversify the supply chain. Overall score card would give Habeck and Scholz a lot better score, Merkel and German business leaders of the time a low score, and Frnce and Germany about the same score. France for a steady response, and Germany for the speed in which the oil and gas crisis handled considering also that both countries have a centralized and decentralized system based on their respective history and culture. ...

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This WSJ report on developers and home buyers in Tianjin show how the government policy of controlling speculation in housing prices affects ordinary home buyers when prices drop. A homebuyer from Hebei province hoped to find a better life in Tianjin, better education for her children. She used her entire savings and borrowed from relatives to pull together funds to buy an apartment for 1.5 million yuan. She is desperate paying the mortgage of 3700 yuan, works several part time jobs, and is mortified at the drop in price of the apartment, in this report. For decades housing prices were going up, now the government has sent clear messages that housing speculation has to stop and home prices for the first time are moderating to increases of about 4% a year and are falling in some cities including Beijing, Tianjin, and Guangzhou. The governments message is that people should use apartments for living, not for speculative price increase and profit. Local governments have their own reasons to prop up this speculation as they have for decades now depended on land sales to meet economic growth targets, a situation unique to China, which has financed a lot of the local infrastructure including overspending. ...

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Biden had his PSA test for prostate cancer about 11 years back in 2014, an astounding fact given that he ran for the presidency in 2019. The nation did not know that all this time this cancer was developing and would affect the manner in which the nation's affairs would be conducted. Putting an unelected Vice President into the White House also has its own serious drawbacks. 

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The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration failed to take action when asked by drivers to investigate incidents of unintended acceleration. It also failed to take up action with the company's quality staff in Japan- who were in charge of things related to quality- after what appeared to be years of inaction and stalling by Toyota. Where it did investigate, the agency did nothing about the complaints when Toyota failed to provide the necessary information. Internal agency documents show that since 2003 the agency opened inquiries into possible Toyota problems, and six times closed them without action of any sort. With agency managers joining Toyota after their work at the agency, there appears to have been a cozy relationship with Toyota. Add to that the lack of a steady hand at the agency- with about 6 changes in directors since 2005- and the current administrator David Strickland only confirmed in December 2009. Throughout its 6 investigations NHTSA regulators were told they have to talk not with Toyota USA but Toyota people in Japan who made the decisions and had the answers, yet no effort was made to break the logjam and get Toyota Japanese managers to provide answers. At one point State Farm Insurance brought the incidents of accidents and near accidents to the attention of NHTSA, something that happened a decade before this in the Ford Explorer roll over accidents. On both occasions NHTSA was slow to act....

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This article in the Economist provides a detailed account on women in the U.S. armed forces. France, the Netherlands, Australia and Canada exceed the U.S. in the percentage of women in the armed forces. The U.S. is at about 15%. This is a good time for women to join the armed forces as rules are being put in place to protect women from sexual assault, women are increasingly accepted in combat units and are accepted for training in the U.S. Army's elite ranger school. Women are in senior positions in the Navy and Air Force. Getting the best people, intellectually capable as well as pysically capable is a challenge for the new forces. Technology has changed the nature of war, and intelligence, preparation, strategy are critical elements for success. Much needs to be done, as the article at about the same time in the NYT about Lieutenant Courtney shows to get intellectually capable women to stay and invigorate the forces. As this article does to some degree the emphasis on physical prowess, and the lack of enough women in the forces to create pressure to create a better environment for women, act as inhibiting factors. The rules are still set in a way that provides less psychic support for women than they do for men. Some of the psychic stress shows up in the higher rate of single parents for female service members, with 12% of active duty women bringing up children on their own compared to 4% for men, and the failure of marraiges of female service members 3 times the rate for male service members....

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With Toyota facing amajor crisis the company speeded up the appointment of the new CEO, the grandson of Kiichiro Toyoda, who founded the automaker as it diversified from its textile automated looms in the prewar years. Note the statement by Koji Endo, analyst of Credit Suisse in Tokyo, that he expects Toyota to lose up to three times the 1.7 billion loss of the current fiscal year ending March 31, in the next fiscal year of 2009. This suggests that a lot will be happening at Toyota as major actions to reduce capacity and to improve management, reduce bureaucracy and speedup decisionmaking are taken by the new President. Especially so as Akio Toyoda, the new CEO, is different from the tradiitonal CEO's who have come up through manufacturing and not educated in the U.S. He will not have the same patience and comfort factor with Toyota's bureaucracy as these other CEO's like Watanabe who preceded him. By pushing the transition up the other elders like Shoichiro Toyoda may want to give Akio time to prepare for the tough decisions he will have to make, and to setup his own management team as early as possible....

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A year after Butler, Pennsylvania attempt on the president's life DJT reflects on it in this interview he granted to Gary O'Donoghue of the BBC. DJT said- "I don't like dwelling on it because if I did, it would be, you know, might be life-changing, I don't want it to have to be that." DJT says he liked "the power of positive thinking, or the power of positive non-thinking". On Russian president Putin and the continuing war in Ukraine- "I thought we had a deal done four times and then you go home, and you see, just attacked a nursing home or something in Kyiv. I said: 'What the hell was that all about?'" "I'm not done with Putin. I'm disappointed in him." On Prince Charles, now King Charles- "a great gentleman." And on Britain's prime minister Starmer hear this- "I really like the prime minister a whole lot, even though he's a liberal."   ...

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Environmental issues for single use plastic are creating a comeback for glass in packaging. In 1975 over half of the packaging of drinks was in glass, then came plastic from zero to make up over 30%. Glassmakers are working to reduce the low recycling rates for glass containers, a major problem. Glass needs to be refilled to reduce its carbon footprint in transport of heavier material.  Aluminium also has a carbon footprint in that 6 times more energy is used in making aluminium than glass containers. To get glass back better recycling has to be implemented.

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M.r Modi recalls the blessings of Mr. Mulayam Singh Yadav given to him with his advice in 2014 when he became prime minister and met Opposition leaders in India. Mulayam Singh was mentored by Ram Manohar Lohia, a socialist educated at Humboldt University in Germany in the 1930's and an early activist in India's Independence struggle under Mohandas Gandhi. PM Modi who has translated many of the ideals of Mr. Lohia into practice with development work for water, sanitation, electricity, gas stoves, housing, for tens of millions, says Mr. Mulayam Singh's advice has stayed with him even today. Without the stability given by leaders such as Lohia and Mulayam Singh India could not have navigated carefully the difficult period of the first 50 years after independence in 1947. For democracy to prevail leadership of this kind is essential. America turned from time to time to leaders such as Lincoln, FDR during its history, India is in a formative period for its democracy as it goes through modernization for a country with 1.2 billion people and many languages.  ...

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Opening windows and doors to let in fresh air is as important as wearing masks and social distancing to prevent coronavirus. In places where people gather and in homes it is important to let in fresh air so that there is new fresh air circulating in rooms 3-4 times for every hour. It is being used as a strategy in schools in Germany to bring in fresh air. Putting MERV 13 type air filters in central air conditioning and heating systems is important in offices, shops and other spaces. A complete redesign of the systems that are old is needed. There are 36,000 schools in the U.S. that have old failing systems of heating and cooling. It would cost $360 billion to change these systems if each system cost $10,000 which is on the low side. This shows that good intentions are not enough, new priorities need to be set and the old priorities which misallocated funds through existing capital allocation structures in the West coasts and East coast cities no longer serve the purpose of the Renewal of America.  ...

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Hong Kong Chief Executive Carrie Lam describes her disappointment at the events in Hong Kong in recent weeks with huge protests against the extradition law. She feels she has been misunderstood but at the same time has not connected with ordinary people and the youth the way she felt she had connected before.

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The questions about LIBOR rate manipulation were first raised in front page articles in the Wall Street Journal in spring 2008. In 2013 Deutsche Bank's U.S. financial systems were strongly criticized by the U.S. Federal Reserve. In April 2015 Deutsche Bank made a $2.5 billion legal settlement with the U.S. and British regulators for LIBOR rate rigging and admitted wrongdoing. It took BaFin the German regulator a long time to flag these irregularities in a strong manner, in its letter to Deutsche Bank. The comments in the Senior Management Review section of its report for the first time expressed in this level of detail the problems at Deutsche Bank, including problems with 11 current or former executives of Deutsche Bank. The letter and report were sent to the bank's management board May 11, 2015. A month later co-CEO's Anshu Jain and Jurgen Fritschen resigned. Ba Fin's top supervisor of large banks, Frauke Menke sent the letter. By the time BaFin acted many other regulators had already flagged the problems at the bank, and the media including the WSJ had already covered the problems in great detail. Between the first report in the WSJ on Libor rate irregularities and the May 11, 2015 report was a period of 7 years. ...

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Preliminary reports cited by The Times of London say Air Traffic Control was understaffed at the time of the accident, a midair collision of American Airlines jet over Washington National Airport. It says only one person was handling landings departures and communications with helicopters in the vicinity of Washington National Airport.

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A phone call took place between president Biden and pm Modi of India on a closer US- India strategic technology partnership following India's making the largest commercial aircraft deal in history for purchase of 470 planes from Airbus and Boeing. The White House says the sale will support over 1 million jobs in 44 states. It also deepens the ties between India and the US.

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The prime minister of India asks people who came up through the National Cadet Corps in colleges and universities to preserve the NCC spirit and look out for dropouts from school at this time of the pandemic. The NCC spirit is to meet that person and find ways to get him back in school or college. To let no person's potential and mind go to waste.

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Macron's call for snap elections quickly is also a move to have the election for National Assembly when the National Rally opposition party has so little time to prepare by June 30 in  just 3 weeks. It comes after the National Rally of Le Pen won 32% of the vote in France in EU elections, about twice the 15% for Macron's En Marche party.

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As the growth of coronavirus cases slows in the U.S. and Europe, cases in India surged by 9000 in a biggest single day increase with total cases passing 200,000. Deaths in New York dropped below 50 on June 2. Outdoor dining opens in upstate New York as this part of New York enters second phase of reopening- tables 6 feet apart and staff wearing masks at all times. Customers required to wear masks when not seated. New York City enters Phase 1 of reopening on June 8. New York City will distribute 1 million face masks and it will be mandatory to wear masks on mass transit. Hand sanitizer will be provided at stations. Every other seat will be blocked off on buses.