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Ezra Klein writes that he disagrees with Bob Woodward's assessment that the Obama administration moved the goalposts by trying to secure an increase in taxes to pay for the deficit. Klein says voters voted in favor of an increase in taxes as part of the effort to reduce the deficit when they elected Obama to a second term.

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There could be a bad ending to the tar sands story, if the environmental pollution, including contamination of waterways and other emissions, cause the Obama administration and Congressional Democrats to ban imports of Canadian oil from tar sands. IT is going to be a sticky issue for discussion between Stephen Harper and the new Obama administration.

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This NYT report by Clifford Krauss cites senior diplomats in the Bush and Obama administration showing Rex Tillerson as a business executive with the skills needed to take a new approach to U.S.- Russian relations damaged by issues such as Ukraine and Syria that led to western sanctions. During Ukraine crisis and sanctions on Russia in 2014 Tillerson did not personally go to Russia, yet continued to negotiate through his exploration chief at ExxonMobil. Other experts such as Mr. Offenheiser of Oxfam America, see Tillerson as facing a quandary of transacting short term deals versus his responsibility to strengthen western institutions, human rights and economic hope for so many. 

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Peter Baker describes Hillary Clinton's memoir "Hard Choices," about her days at the State Department as covering an enormous amount of ground about different countries but failing to bring the reader close to the events and how they happened. Clinton has written a politically safe memoir, says Baker, with an eye on the presidential election of 2016. There is little detail on her relationship with her rival for the Democratic nomination in 2008, U.S. president Obama. And on Clinton's struggles and hard times when faced with difficult issues the reader gets no more than a passing glimpse without inner details of the events. When compared to predecessor Dean Acheson's memoirs of his days at the State Department under Truman, this memoir looks rather tame, even in comparison with Defense Secretary Gates's recent memoir.

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Wolfgang Ischinger, former German ambassador to the U.S. 2001-2006 and president of the Munich Security Conference, says that one thing that would make a difference in the current state of German and European relations with the U.S. after NSA spying on chancellor Merkel, is for president Obama to show contrition. The continuing dynamics are important, as is evident in the deterioration in relations in 2003 following the American intervention in Iraq when not enough was done, says Ischinger. His view is that the proposals to limit diplomatic personnel of the U.S. in European countries, or putting on hold the Trans-Atlantic trade talks, are not good ideas as they do not help restore trust. Building on a report by the European parliament in 2001 on protections against intelligence operations would be a good start.

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Simon Johnson and Peter Boone say not taking forceful action with the large banks- taking them through bankruptcy and restructuring procedures as advocated by senior Federal Reserve officials like Peter Hoenig- will only lead to irreversible damage. The current Geithner-Summers policy being followed by the Obama administration is simply to hope that by fiscal stimulus and economic recovery the banks may be brought to sustained profits and be able to muddle through their financial problems. This Johnson argues is not likely to happen and the cost will be higher debt levels for America, irreversible damage as America faces low debt and financially stronger countries in Asia and sees its position in the world weaken. The muddle through policies for banks of the Obama administration have little prospects in the face of an IMF estimated $275 billion shortfall in capital on balance sheets at large banks (from the IMF Global Financial stability Report). Without aggressive action on the banks America's recovery and renewal will only delayed....

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Ben Van Heuvelen documents in the Washington Post what Ali Nabhan and Bradley pointed out in the WSJ in May 2009, that the officers in the Iraqi army lacked the training and discipline to act as an effective fighting force. These early indications proved correct and were ignored by the Iraqi government and the Obama administration till it was too late with the fall of Mosul and the ensuing chaos in Iraq.

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Peter Baker offers an assessment of U.S. president Obama's 2015 State of the Union address in 2015, as marking the huge disconnect between him and the Republicans in Congress, after Republicans took control of both Houses of Congress. Obama offered programs for 2 years of free community college and student aid, and other programs that have no realistic basis without the two parties coming to an agreement. For most of the evening he appeared to be talking to his own party's base towards the end of his presidency. Baker asks if this was irresponsible considering that it had little basis in reality. Especially when opportunities to help the middle class and working class Americans were missed earlier in the two term presidency.

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House Majority Leader Eric Cantor rejects the McConnell plan for raising the debt ceiling. Senate Minority Leader McConnell says on a conservative talk show- "all of a sudden we have co-ownership of a bad economy. That is very bad positioning going into an election." McConnell's plan is to shift the responsibility for raising the debt ceiling to President Obama, by separating debt reduction talks from debt ceiling talks. Cantor believes its best to push on with cutting back spending. Obama's response was to offer $1.7 trillion in spending cuts, at which point he expected Republicans to support tax increases, telling Cantor in negotiations "enough is enough." The McConnell plan is supported by Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and Republicans in the Senate. The details of the plan are being are being worked out, with one strategy being to add to it the $1.5 trillion in spending cuts identified in bipartisan talks with Vice President Biden. Both sides are looking at this jockeying for advantage for the 2012 election. At one point in the talks with Cantor, Mr Obama is reported to have told him- "Eric, don't call my bluff. You know I'm going to take this to the American people." Cantor for his part, wants to limit the duration of the debt ceiling increase so that it would be a short term extension and would come up for a vote before the 2012 presidential election....

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President Biden was the first US president on a picket line when he joined the picket line at a UAW strike in Wixom, Michigan recently. Here Gene Sperling the Biden liason with the autoworkers UAW union, says Biden believes in a strategy that counters technological disruption in a different way. Biden wants companies to retool, reinvest and rehire workers in the same impacted community. This is the striking difference with Biden compared to any of his predecessors Reagan, Clinton, Obama, and the two Bush presidents. Not only will the president's support ensure 1200 jobs are preserved, another 1000 union jobs will be added at the Belvedire, Illinois location and $4.8 billion will be invested by Stellantis for a new parts distribution center and and electric vehicle factory.

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The campaign to establish net neutrality. It is purported to address the problem of phone and cable companies blocking access to websites and interfering with internet traffic. The FCC passed new net neutrality rules by a 3-2 vote. The net neutrality rules are supported by Mr. Obama, and FCC chairman Julius Genachowski, a former law school friend of Obama.

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Former U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates points out in this intervew with Holman Jenkins of the WSJ, that Iraq's prime minister, Nouri al-Maliki, who worsened Shiite-Sunni relations, was the principal cause of the unraveling that happened in Iraq during the first term of U.S. president Obama. He says President Obama failed to do what was done by president Bush to persist and obtain Status of Forces Agreement with Iraq, to maintain a U.S. foce presence in Iraq. Presence of U.S. forces would have prevented the spread of Islamic State in Iraq and Syria. U.S. force presence would have provided a more even handed treatment of Sunnis in the region, creating the conditions for peace by having Sunnis, Kurds and Shiites continue talks about the future of Iraq. Gates grew up in Kansas in the 1950's, attended the College of William and Mary for undergraduate studies, studied Russian and Soviet history in grad school at Indiana University and Georgetown University, before joining the CIA. Gates was selected by Brzezinski to work in the White House, worked under Brent Snowcroft, and as head of the CIA (1991-1993) during the elder Bush administration. He was Secretary of Defense from 2006-2011, under presidents George Bush and Barack Obama, succeeding Donald Rumsfeld. He was succeeded by Leon Panetta, Chuck Hagel, and Ashton Carter. ...

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Th Obama administration's Home Affordable Modification Program, or HAMP, is designed to provide relief to homeowners facing foreclosure. HAMP has also prevented these homes -from the seven million home loans that are delinquent -from joining the overall inventory of homes, and depressing home prices further. Eighteen months after HAMP was introduced, it looks like HAMP has failed to help homeowners to the extent needed to revive housing. Of the 1.3 million modifications extended to homeowners, about half have been cancelled, and about one third or 422,000 homeowners have received permanent loan modifications. The results for July 2010 show that it is slowing down even more. The number of homeowners receiving modifications in July is growing at a much slower rate. 17,000 new trial modifications were started in July, 2010, but 5 times that number of loan modifications were cancelled. HAMP has reduced the montly payment through a lower interest rate and longer term, with the average borrower receiving a montly modification of $500. But even with lower payments and permanent modifications homeowners still have lots of debt. The median rato of total debt payments to pretax income is around 63.5%. And analysts estimate that 20% of borrowers with permanent modifications will re-default. The program had aroused huge expectations, hoping to help 3 million homeowners. Which is why Professor Kenneth Rosen, of the University of California, Berkeley, considers the results embarrassing for the Obama administration. Adding that the Obama administration should be ashamed of these results after all the hopes that were aroused for real help to homeowners. ...

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A proposal for deficit reduction from the "Gang of Six" in the U.S. Senate gains support from Obama, Boehner and Cantor, as other proposals languish for lack of support in both Houses of Congress. The efforts to pass a balanced budget amendment and deficit reduction in the House is now seen as a concession to newly elected conservatives in the House by Boehner even as other options are being pursued to meet an August 2, 2011 deadline. The efforts of credit rating agencies to reconsider the credit ratings of certain states and the U.S. is also putting new pressure on getting some sort of serious deficit reduction now as opposed to putting it off for discussion between now and the end of the year, as proposed by the McConnell plan.

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From the beginning, the infrastructure building component of the $787 Stimulus Bill, was never really what it was described in the rhetoric of the Obama administration. Even using the broadest definintion of infrastructure spending, the money allocated was never more than $150 billion, by one estimate. And only 8% of the total or $64 billion, went to roads, public transport, rail, bridges, aviation, and waste-water systems. The money allocated to high speed rail was about $8 billion, too small for high speed rail network for the US, and this has proved to be a debacle. Work moved slowly, so that by October 2009 work under the highway and transit programmes had seen work start on $14.3 billion of projects. The new $50 billion infrastructure plan from the Obama administration, includes ideas for a National Infrastructure Bank. But by now the public mood has turned against spending, and political support for a gas tax to pay for it is lacking. The ultimate irony of this situation is that the public thinks the stimulus bill has taken care of infrastructure. So many false expectations were created, and vigorously built up by the Obama administration, such as describing the stimulus investment as "the largest new investment in infrastructure since Eisenhower built an interstate highway system in the 1950's." The irony is that the public perception is that the stimulus has already taken care of the US's infrastructure needs, says the transport director of the Chamber of Commerce....

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DJT arrives in Beijing China May 13 2026. Topics that will be discussed are - the Iran War and how to resolve it, trade with China, tariffs, and US Taiwan policy. China continues to run trillion dollar surplus in trade with the world with lower trade surplus with the US after DJT tariffs. From $295 billion in 2024 under Biden the new DJT administration with DJT, Bessent and Jamieson has lowered this to $202 billion by 2026. In that same period the world trade surplus of China has increased from $992 to $1.19 billion. It is not clear whether some of the drop in the US figures is from China sending product through channels to Mexico and Vietnam that is then shipped to the US. DJT showed results in his policies by lowering the trade imbalance by 32%, while trade imbalance with the rest of the world has worsened (increase in trade surplus of China) by 20%. What does this show? We can safely assume that excessive trade imbalances are not in either China, EU, or America's interest. China increases trade and political friction by doing so, and it leaves its own policy weak by overdependence on exports, too little effort to increase domestic consumption and living standards.  FOr the US and EU trade imbalances with China of over $1 trillion reflect misguided policy at the top by US and EU decision makers and governments. By exposing their manufacturing base they are losing valuable jobs by the millions and creating a situation where the few with good jobs in select industries live in large cities and the rest of the country in smaller towns and rural areas suffering from lack of amanufacturing base. This weakens the investment base for public services and leads to lack of investment ininfrastructure. This is called deindustrialization which the DJT and Biden administrations both fight hard to reverse for the last 10 years since the disastrous years of the Obama and Bush administrations 2000-2016. For this reason we can say a good Republican is as good as a good Democrat, a bad Republican is as bad as a bad Democrat, political labels are just that labels. The media in US and EU are on a wrong footing and still fail to cover this the way it should be covered to shake off the lethargy in public sentiment in the US so that a rapid drive to reindustrialize and build new new infrastructure on top of the old that was built after World War 1 can take place. In today's world India is stepping up with major infrastructure building just as the US and EU ramp up their rebuilding.  ...

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By June 7 US stocks were up 11.5% in the first half of 2026, showing a resilient stock market whatever economists say about tariffs and other policies. There is a lot of misinformation on the changes in trade policy. Sure the deficits over $1 trillion had become so excessive to be a burden for the US ( this is not even to address the 20:5:2  the 20 trillion transfer in US wealth to foreign countries, 5 million jobs lost and the 2% low growth since 2000 that USTR Lighthizer and Jamieson point out in Foreign Affairs magazine in 2026).  Greg Ip comments on this in today's WSJ that betting against DJT trade and economic policy is not working. Here we have another flashback to Brexit and why a similar situation of misinformation had the opposite result. The value of the pound dropped from $1.55 to $1.35 to the US dollar in June 2016 the day Brexit referendum was won by Reform UK and the Conservatives. Today it is $1.33 in June 2026. Here is some history of Britain's tussle with the European Union. When did it start? In 1961 Britain applied to join. The French never too eager to have the British inside rejected in 1967 under nationalist De Gaulle. It took 12 years  not till 1973 did Britain get in with Denmark and both kept their currencies. As soon as Britishers complained about the bureaucracy in European Union Brussels headquarters conservatives like Boris Johnson drove this to a high pitch. He even said only way it would affect Britain was in the price of a Mars chocolate bar. Well in 2026 it is much more than that. Labour's Wes Streeting calls it a disastrous step for the UK economy to isolate it from Europe.  As usual the French don't care and the Germans showed little interest, so Britain was left to its own devices not being careful would mean bearing the costs. Manchester's mayor Burnham in Labour says he grasps this but there are other priorities that are pressing and shelves this for another time. It took 12 years to get UK into the European Union- it took just a few years under shortsighted Cameron, May and Johnson to get out when after austerity policies imposed by Cameron a lot of anger had shifted to Labourites and Blair's policies like the shortsighted policies of Bush and Obama, for the 20 trillion US lost to foreigners in their watch. Will it take another 12 years again for UK to get it right and get France and Germany to enthusiastically support Britain in the EU? ...

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New York Governor Cuomo gives unions and the state's Education Department 30 days to settle a lawsuit brought by teachers. The lawsuit delays job performance evaluations for teachers which include student test results. Cuomo said the alternative was for him to pass new legislation requiring this. He gives school districts 1 year to implement the new system using the framework setup by the state or loss of $805 million in state aid. Cuomo said: "No evaluation, no money. Period." This money comes from the Obama administrations Race to the Top education program which provides additional funding to states that make such improvements.

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There is little chance that Mexico is going to pay for a wall, or that it is possible to prevent remittances by Mexicans working in the U.S., says O'Grady in the WSJ. President Obama says about preventing each and every Western Union remittances transaction "good luck with that."

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A bipartisan proposal of Tim Johnson and Mike Crapo of the Senate Banking Committee to replace Fannie and Freddie with a new system that removes the implicit government guarantee, has the support of the Obama administration. A proposal by Republicans in the House removes the government backstop entirely. Fannie and Freddie stock lost about a third of their value in March 2014 falling to $4.03 and $4.04, erasing sharp gains made in 2013. Under the proposal supported by most members of the Banking Committee, including Bob Corker, it is likely that private shareholders will not be treated favorably.

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In this interview with Der Spiegel Bernie Sanders reflects on the 2016 election. He says that the Democratic Party missed the fact that many people in the midwest, south and other parts of the country, were worse off after president Obama left than when he came in in 2008. He also says Hillary Clinton relied too heavily on speechwriters and advisers upto the point of  having three speechwriters say why she was running for president. He finds the cuts proposed to healthcare, in the budget, and action on climate change, immoral. He also points out about the investigations that Mr. Mueller is someone everybody respects and that it would be wrong to offer a biased opinion, that Trump supporters would see this in the way that he is picked on when he just came in. He also believes Trump supporters are like other voters and are likely to look at the results, how better off they are under the Trump administration.