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Larry Fink thinks there has been for retirement "an historical shift from certainty to uncertainty," from security in the earlypost war years of Truman, Eisenhower, Kennedy and LBJ to precarious living in the post Reagan era of "free to choose." It is mind boggling to grasp the idea that 4 in 10 Americans lack $400 in emergency funds for a health emergency. It has been hard to wrap my mind around such a fact. Are you in the same boat? Larry Fink CEO of Black Rock financial firm with half of its $10 trillion of funds in investment assigned to retirement has joined us. Fink says- "America needs an organized high level effort to ensure that future generations can live out their lives in dignity." He wants some hard conversations. And here are his initial thoughts- Create predictable income streams like pensions for all workers including lower paid or part-time workers.  Follow 20 states in setting up retirement systems to cover all workers, including gig and part time workers in lower paid income jobs. This covers a huge number of workers counted by the millions who perform the work that makes the country and the economy run. From workers in restaurants to hospitality workers, and in lower paid health care jobs, in help for the elderly, help for children in child care. Encourage employers to offer matching funds. ...

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This interview of David Westin with Katherine Tai at the Aspen Institute shows how this US Foreign Trade Representative reflects today's priorities based on an entirely different environment than what was faced before- after the pandemic, after concern about supply chains, the effect on workers, the domestic economy, and on democracy of trade policies, the effects of AI. Westin says "You are US FTR, you travel abroad cover the globe literally, it covers geopolitics.." Katherine Tai makes it clear from the beginning- "It is all about domestic, I do as much domestic travel as foreign travel. We sit at the interconnection of very very complex forces.Trade absolutely is about economics. The decisions we make in trade policy impacts the domestic economy. We are part of foreign policy, we are equally a part of domestic economic policy team. These two are pulling you in opposite directions. This foreign aspect has to be connected to what we do at home." Four pillars the Biden administration has for trade all relate to the domestic economy- for infrastructure, climate change action, workers and manufacturing at home, democracy and resilience. It is worker centric for workers in the US economy and the economy of its partners, Tai points out that it is in the interest of the other countries that trade with US to give fair wages and benefits to their workers, not something that they do for the US.     ...

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Biden's hard work and going into details and seeing that projects are delivered on time and in quality for the $1.2 trillion infrastructure law will make him an enduring president in the 21st century. Tyler Pager gives this report on the Biden style of making decisions and of getting things done on time that are making a big difference for the ease of living for all Americans.  Of Biden using his 36 years of negotiating in the Senate more than any Congressman including LBJ who only had 12 years, and the hard work from someone who commuted by Amtrak for all those years and attended to every detail. For the president who started out as county councilman in Delaware details matter, he looks into the details of rebuilding infrastructure by delivering projects on time and on scale. In late 2022 Tyler says Biden checked into the details of delays and wanted specifics which projects were not delivered on time for the $1.2 trillion infrastructure law passed a year earlier. Seeing this only one leader comes to mind prime minister Modi of India who is faced with a huge task of infrastructure projects and investments that are intended to make India the third largest economy in the world. Modi like Biden uses his experience of getting into details and checking that work is delivered on time, putting in the hard work in earnest, from Modi's work with state projects in Gujarat when he led the state for 15 years as chief minister. ...

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Sanders, the most senior leader  for Democrats in the Senate says Biden is the most effective president in modern American history, through the pandemic with a bold vision for the country. Bernie Sanders, the senior senator from Vermont, says he will do all to get president Biden reelected.  To critics he says Enough! Sanders says Americans should support Biden because of the American Rescue Plan that he orchestrated and helped the economy recover faster than was thought possible. It put Americans back to work, provided cash benefits to people worried about the future, and protected hospitals, small businesses and schools. Through his Infrastructure Plan Biden has created millions of well paying jobs and is repairing America's broken and neglected for decades infrastructure- roads, bridges, airports, and mass transit. Then there is the largest investment for climate change action in history, there is student debt relief for 5 million people, delivered free vaccines, cheaper insulin, and capped price pharmaceuticals. Biden says the health system is broken and hugely expensive and America still needs a health coverage for all single payer system. A lot remains to be done and this is just the beginning to fulfill the hopes and aspirations of the American people. No amount of dissimulation, distortion of facts can change that. Roosevelt said in 1932- "GIve me your help not to win votes alone, but to win in this crusade to restore America to its own people." ...

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Hear this America- Calling something that is all around us a hoax is not like telling a lie on media. Calling a thing a hoax when it is a growing Threat has Big, Big, Big consequences that you might not even want to think about. Project 2025 and "Drill Baby Drill" would create billions of tons more of carbon pollution and destroy any climate change action that would help control climate change- causing even bigger fires and sudden floods all over the world. The cost says think tank Energy Innovation is 2.7 billion tons of carbon pollution- what India emits in 1 year- and 1.7 million job losses by 2030 from jobs lost in renewable energy including small offset from fossil fuels. The cost would be at the minimum over $1 trillion dollars to repair by 2028- the cost of not taking action on climate change for four years, of additional floods and fires larger than ones before,  and of tackling the additional damage to the climate, the loss of the technological advances needed over next 4 years, the investments needed to tackle a much larger problem than it is now. It would require larger deficits to tackle and risk the health and well being of future generations. For the US compared to China the consequence will be a severe loss of technological advantage in the technologies for renewable energy that no longer, no longer have the support of the government as they do in China.   ...

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The complete Transcript of the Harris Trump television debate on ABC Television that went on for 90 minutes. As expected Harris remained organized, thoughtful and precise in her answers to questions of cost of living, the economy, and never wavered in her focus on her plan for an Opportunity Economy that lifts all boats where she said Trump had none. Trump raised the immigration issue in questions about the economy and cost of living failing to tackle one issue at a time and do it well and convincingly. Harris brought up Trump's focus on himself and billionaires, and on Project 2025, when Trump talked about immigration. Trump's response on Project 2025 was long and rambling and failed to register losing critical minutes and spreading himself thin leaving behind the idea that he had no Plan for America, for if he had one would he not have offered it when the question was raised. This set the pattern for the rest of the debate. The next issue Trump hoped to focus on was migrant crime after immigration. This is where his exaggeration that migrant crime was rampant came under the first fact check of the evening by David Muir. Something that other moderators had amazing as it sounds neglected their duty to do - all of them failed to do this with rigor and on the spot- till David Muir. “As you know, the F.B.I. says overall violent crime is coming down in this country.” ...

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Extreme drought affected Minnesota cattle farmers leading to elimination of many cattle herds.               Wildfire smoke from Canada settled down over the cities of St Paul and Minneapolis for days.                 Lack of enough snow and ice in winter led to losses in ice fishing and cross country skiing making winters unnatural in Great Lakes Region that also includes Wisconsin and Michigan. Walz acted, and his plain spoken communication style made a difference clearing misperceptions. Pew Research shows 67% of Americans favor clean energy but misperceptions abound.          Minnesota during his two terms now produces 50% of its energy from wind, solar and nuclear. Minnesota is now likely to be ahead of California in getting to 100% wind solar and nuclear for all its energy. Walz set the date 2040 into law for this to happen with 40 climate initiatives. A bill signed into law speeds up the permits for renewable energy projects. Walz’s communication style shows that when people understand the benefits and specifics you get things done. “The surest way to get people to buy in is to create a job that pays well in their community. All of us are going to have to be better about our smart politics, about bringing people in.”        ...

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As David Ignatius points out in his trip to China, the China of post 2010 is a lot of things depending on who you talk to in China- cocky, scared, anxious. He comes away perplexed by the range of questions that come up in his mind. The wealth of the coastal cities is stunning, and at the same time as the leaders insist China is still a poor country with deep regional imbalances, and what is less mentioned, the rising inequality in society. How to pull it all together to make possible a transition to development that is evened out across all regions and sections of society and to allow freedom of expression, is a challenge for the new leadership of Xi Jinping in 2011.

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ESPN television network sports reporter Allison Williams leaves ESPN after refusing to follow ESPN's vaccine mandate because of fertility concerns. She starts a sports series at the conservative Daily Wire which advertises her series as "sports without the woke." Woke started out as a term for black people who felt marginalized, but has changed meanings several times and is a classic example of how meanings change with internet use. Woke now also means people who feel they are being discriminated against for their views. Mrs Williams, 37 years old, says she wants a second child and is concerned that this could affect her fertility or her pregnancy, according to an earlier interview with WSJ.  How the vaccine mandate and companies implementing the vaccine mandate handle it to accomodate concerns of this kind will be a test of its effectiveness and perceptions about its sensitivity to human concerns beyond politics. For people with health concerns new solutions are needed. Abraham Lincoln faced a similar situation after the civil war that Biden faces today and there is much to be learned from his words- "with malice towards none, with charity for all," to bring together all Americans.    ...

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The Dutch government of prime minsiter Mark Rutte resigned on January 14, 2021, after a parliamentary report showed that 26,000 families were wrongly accused by the tax authority of claiming child allowance since 2012. 10,000 families were asked to repay the amount leading to bankruptcies, divorces. Mr. Rutte admitted that there wa a breakdown "at all levels of the state." The opposition Labour Party social affairs minister at the time in the government resigned over the affair. The parliamentary investigative committee chairman says that the problem was pervasive at all levels of the government, including civil servants, bureaucrats and judges. There was he says systematic racism as people with foreign sounding names were singled out. Experts from think tanks say there is little political cost to Rutte and  ministers from his People's Freedom and Democracy Party. New elections are to be held soon and Rutte will continue with a caretaker government. Polls show he has 30% support twice that of the next party the anti-Islam Freedom party of Geert Wilders.  The government has set aside 500 million euros in compensation, 30,000 euros for each family. ...

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Daily coronavirus cases dropped to the lowest level since March 30, 2021. Cases on June 19 were at 58,000 and deaths at 1154 for India's population of 1.2 billion people. The only state with cases over 10,000 was Kerala, and close to 9000 was Tamilnadu. Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh were at over 5000. All these states are in southern India. Only Maharashtra with about 9000 cases was in northern India. The positivity rate in Maharashtra state was 3% and in Mumbai 2%.  The Indian government has a clear vaccine policy and it is for vaccine supplies and vaccination drive to be under the federal government. This puts responsibility in one place and makes it possible to achieve the target of vaccinating 1.2 billion people by December 31, 2021, with the federal government putting all the resources it can muster into the effort. The economy is also linked to how the vaccination supply effort and vaccination drive progresses in the next 6 months, so that the goal of vaccination is closely linked to economic recovery and progress for India as a whole. A good monsoon rainy season would also help the rural economy recovery. ...

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It took 4 hours and fifty minutes for Rafa Nadal to win the U.S. Open Tennis Championships against newcomer Danil Medvedev. At 33 years Nadal had to overcome hurdles physical and mental. He won the first two sets 7-5, 6-3, before losing the next 2 sets 5-7, 4-6. It took all the hard work he does on the court practicing his strokes to help him win the fifth deciding set 6-4.

Nadal says of the match- "The last three hours of the match were very, very, intense, no? Very tough mentally and physically too. The crowd were amazing, all these facts that make the moment super special, no? unforgettable moment."

The crowd of 24,000 boisterous fans were with Nadal, particularly after Medvedev's brat like statements the week before, but were also carried away by the intensity of the game and the skills of the younger player.

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The steep decline in popularity of French president Emmanuel Macron in the period of one year. With the yellow vest protests on the economic insecurity of struggling families, Macron's efforts to bring in business friendly policies as a change agent are itself out of step with the times and with France in the provinces and small towns, as pointed out in the New York Times and Times of London analysis of the situation in France today.

As pointed out in the analysis Macron's base itself is small and its anti-institutional posture rejecting conventional politics itself has given momentum to the current yellow vest protests about economic insecurity of struggling families. The support for this comes from all parts of society and single political party, without nationalism, race or migration as factors at all, and comes so soon in one year from the time that Macron emerged with his own movement rejecting the institutional structure.  

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The head of India's leading information technology company WIPRO, Abidali Neemuchwala,  says he took the risky path by choosing an assignment to South Africa when his peers were heading for the United States as engineers. That assignment gave him a chance for higher level activities, better perspective, and ways he could stand out.  He tells how these early experiences helped shape him for the job he has today.

The best way to tell when one is taking a risky path, he says, is when all your peers are not looking at doing what you have chosen to do. Its different, and it has made all the difference for Neemuchwala. In 1994 South Africa was entering the Mandela era after Apartheid, and presented something very different from the United States. Mr Abidali chose this risky and different path, with new opportunities as well as a leap into the unknown. 

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On Gandhi Jayanti remembering American president FDR's contribution to Hind Swaraj. FDR rejected Churchill's ideas of retaining the British Empire's colonies while fighting the German Nazis in the name of freedom. FDR said- " India should be made a commonwealth at once. After a certain number of years- 5 perhaps or 10- she should be able to choose whether she wants to remain in the Empire or have complete independence." 

FDR (US president Franklin Roosevelt) said -"I can't believe that we can fight a war against fascist slavery, and at the same time not work to free people all over the world from a backward colonial policy."

 

 

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The opposition in China and South Korea to Japan's release of slightly radioactive water into the sea stems from a distrust of Japanese data that supported by the International Atomic Energy Agency says the discharge does not affect public health. By next March 2% of the accumulated water will be released. In all 1.2 million tons are planned to be released over 30 years starting August 24, 2023. That water contains small quantities of radioactive tritium which Japan says is less than what Chinese nuclear plants release into the sea. TEPCO which manages the Fukushima plant decommissioning says it will post the data on release and level of radioactive material on its website with comparison to the levels seen as not affecting health that WHO has set.

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The other title of this article in the NYT was "California's fading Political Machines and volatile race for Governor." Gone are the days when Pat Brown was able to put his son Jerry Brown in the race for governor, there are 9 persons running for governor of California in 2026. The current governor Gavin Newsom is said to be promoting his book in Nashville, Tennessee, where many Californians are moving with the inflated cost of housing in the state. Gavin Newsom's grand father gave a $5000 check to Pat Brown in 1943 to run for District Attorney, this report says citing the book. From that time Pat Brown became Attorney General and then governor of California in 1958, defeating Richard Nixon in 1962. In 1962 Pat Brown seemed vulnerable as his signature accomplishment setting up the UC system of college campuses and the water reservoir, tax increases to pay for this, were in their beginning stages and their lasting value not recognized at the time. Nixon from Whittier, California, was a former Vice President and was seen as likely winner. This toughly fought election created the Pat Brown myth and so called machine that helped his son Jerry Brown to two terms as governor 1975 to 1983, and again after serving as Mayor of Oakland and Attorney General to come back to governors race again in 2011 (because term limits came after 2011) and be governor again 2011-2018. Another way of looking at it is that in his last two terms it was also Jerry Brown's careful balancing of the budget and finances of the state, his environmental support, that made him a reliable figure for the public interest not just the political machine backing him.  California to be sure has had popular governors on both sides Reagan won in 1966 as governor of California to succeed Pat Brown. The Kennedys and Pat Brown are matched by the Reagan supporters in the state. In today's situation where China's dominance in industry and manufacturing has affected all parts of deindustrialized America, California is no exception, where much of the middle class has seen their savings eroded, the issues are different and the challenges are different. ...

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For readers who heard about the restoration of U.S. relations with Cuba this may come as a surprise to know that the Cuban trade embargo by the U.S. is still in place. President Trump plans to reverse the steps take by president Obama for better relations. This story in the WSJ is unusual showing how much Cubans are looking for consumer goods so that they make a 13 hour trip to Russia for this. It is hard to believe after all the media coverage on restoration of relations with the U.S..  Cuba remains economically stuck in the past in the range of consumer goods available, and this looks likely to continue even after all the publicity following president Obama's trip there in 2016.

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Scientists say the drought in the western region of the US is the worst in hundreds of years. At Lake Mead the reservoir is only 28% full. The other reservoirs on the Colorado river are in similar shape. Lake Mead is a reservoir from the Hoover Dam on the Colorado River and stretches for 120 miles in the states of Arizona and Nevada. It is the largest reservoir in the US and the water depletion in this and other reservoirs all the way into Oregon is affecting agriculture in the western US and the access to water for cities in the region. 

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Zelensky is going to Hiroshima to make his own case for support directly to all G7 leaders. The fact that G7 leaders are meeting in Japan also has significance as Japan unlike Europe with NATO faces Russian presence in its northern islands and China in the South China Sea and around Taiwan, North Korea, with only the American defense agreement in any conflict. Japan, Australia and India would want to see a clear end to the conflict in Eastern Europe that also sends a message that the status quo will be preserved on Taiwan and other issues in Asia. 

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Michelle Yeoh, Ocar winner, describes her role in promoting the UN Sustainability Goals, the millions of women who are part of the 2.7 billion people she says lack digital connectivity around the world, and face barriers to information and resources in all spheres of their lives. She wants to put the spotlight on the women who are on the frontlines of crisis- who are rebuilding their communities, taking care of children and older people, and putting food on the table. Yeoh says she is 60 and she know what perseverance means, but nothing compares to what these women are doing today.

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De Plessis had this to say about Virat Kohli as he struggles to score well in the Indian cricket league. "Great players go through things like this. And great characters find a way through it." De Plessis led South Africa to a winning series against India on South African soil. He led a team of Dutch and English Afrikaaners, black players, and players of Indian heritage, and kept his team motivated and together winning the hearts of many South Africans of all races. In this way he knows a thing or two about how character can help cricketers through difficult situations.

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Trading relationships and supply chain relationships of China with Japan, and other ASEAN nations built up since China joined the international trading system and became a major exporter are interconnected with the political relationships unraveling over issues such as Taiwan and maritime disputes. It took three decades for China to build up exports and manufacturing for exports of $1 trillion to the US and EU in 2021. Freedom of navigation in international waters and oceans, respect for international law, is important to all trading nations particularly Japan and China, that depend on maritime trade for their economies. 

 

 

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A vote to call witnesses, including former National Security Advisor Mr. Bolton, by Democrats fails in the Senate 51 votes against to 49 votes in favor, with only 2 Republican Senators voting in favor. The impeachment trial of president Trump now goes forward to a vote almost certain to acquit Mr. Trump of all charges of abuse of power and obstruction of justice. A key vote was cast in favor by Republican Senator Lamar Alexander who said Mr. Trump had acted inappropriately on Ukraine but this clearly was not treason, and not a high crime and misdemeanors, the bar set in the Constitution for impeachment.

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Issues of lack of leadership on climate change that face David Malpass, head of the World Bank are discussed in this report in The Guardian. The Biden administration sees this as a problem because of the need for strong leadership and action in developing countries on climate change, and for financing to support this. Malpass was selected by president Trump for this position and Mr. Trump is known for taking the US out of the Paris Climate change Accords. The climate change related floods, drought and fires in 2022 have created anew awareness of the need for strong action worldwide by all institutions and world leaders.