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New GI Bill taking effect August 2009, has not received much attention but it will help bring more equity into the system and provide better opportunities for university education to those who serve in the armed forces and thus help increase mobility in the USA, with those previously unable to afford an education or restricted to small community colleges able to take advantage of the best opportunties they can work hard for and use their potential and abilities. It makes for a more educated and effective military as young people with high school diplomas are more likely to take advantage of military service for 3 years to get a good university education. So its quite probable that more people and better and more intelligent and able recruits would join the military service at the same time that some of the military recruits who have already served three years go to colleges to take advantage of the new GI Bill. It costs the military $5.7 billion in incentives and other recruitment costs to meet the demand for service personnel over the next 5 years, but this can now be used towards the cost of the GI Bill. Also there is some fairness and equity in the idea of the GI Bill, and something that would appeal to candidates like Obama who believes that the income gaps in the country and the educational gaps in the country between the affluent and the those struggling at the lower end of the class structure has widened considerably in the last two decades. See Obama's interview with the WSJ on June 17, 2008, during his visit to Flint, Michigan, for an economic theme speech. Previously the educational assistance went upto only $39,000 and could not be passed onto a spouse or child, something that candidate MCain added to the bill. It also includes a monthly stipend for living expenses in addition to the tution, so its fair and generous program for GI's, and may bring some of the benefits in bringing mobility between the classes and new infusion of energy through a more equitable system for young people who may otherwise be left out of opportunities for a better education and better job opportunities even after risking their lives for service. Getting in the brighter more motivated for education people who otherwise might not opt for the military who then pursue higher education will help the miltary improve quality of personnel and help bring more dynamism into society with their energy and enthusuasm and hard work and discipline....

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Zeit Online shows in this article the continued efforts of the Russian government of president Putin to discredit Chancellor Merkel, following efforts to do this for Hillary Clinton in the U.S. presidential election.  During the Ukraine crisis and the settlement accords of 2014 Germany was seen as a partner by Russia, following sanctions, and renewal of these sanctions Russia no longer sees Germany as a partner. This report shows Russian efforts to discredit chancellor Merkel and the use of RT German channel, WikiLeaks reports of Chancellor Merkel and the TTIP agreement, for the same purpose. The refugee crisis following what is happening in Syria with Russian involvement, terrorism, financial crisis aftermath from 2008, are being used  says Zeit Online to support a movement for "order" as the state ideology now put forward from the Russian government. This could be an early indicator for the 2017 German federal elections, says Zeit Online. Merkel has said that she supports continuation of western sanctions on Russia. It is hard to see what Russia has gained in improving its economy and the standard of living of the people from this type of political action. Putin was able to achieve economic goals during 2005-2010 using good Germany- Russian relations as shown in LyrArc. This was the earlier period of Putin's terms in office, with a broad group of advisors, including finance minister Kudrin, who set forward a prudent economic course for Russia including foreign investment. The world and Russia are poorer from the departure from this earlier set of policies which would have enhanced Russia's economic growth. Kudrin was fired in September 2011, and the economic course has gradually drifted away from what is most prudent for the Russian economy and growth, and for the global economy. Nationalism was part of an earlier period before 1950, that led to frequent wars and economic catastrophes. A new course has been set since then, especially by American presidents Truman and Eisenhower, and people in India, China, the developing world, in Europe and in the U.S., would see little to gain from the politics of that earlier period in world relations.  ...

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Germany's chancellor Merkel sees Britain as necessary for Europe and the European spirit. This even though she has differences with British prime minister Cameron on how to elect the new president of the EU following EU parliamentary elections in May 2014. She told the German parliament in June 2014- "Britain is really no cozy partner. Yet Germany and Britain share values and interests. I consider it grossly negligent, in fact unacceptable, how easily some people say that it is really all the same whether Britain goes along or not, or more: whether Britain remains a member of the European Union or not."

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The ECB president Draghi announces an interest rate cut, lowering the interest rate in the eurozone to 0.15% from 0.25%. He also lowered the rate on overnight bank deposits at the ECB to a negative 0.10%, to encourage banks to lend at a time when credit is tight for businesses in the eurozone. The eurozone faces a risk of deflation with low growth in the eurozone economies. Popular discontent was reflected in eurozone elections in France, UK, Greece and Spain.

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"The best port in the storm," is how officials in Brussels described Greek prime minister Samaras in October 2012, as Samaras negotiated terms with the EU/ECB/IMF team for the next instalment of funds from the EU.

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Greece passed what prime minister Samaras called the last of the austerity cuts in November 2012 and called for action by lenders in the EU. The EU's Rehn says it is time to dispel the notion that Greece has not made progress in making the economic changes needed. Finance ministers of the eurozone meeting in Brussels agreed to give Greece two more years to reach deficit reduction targets. The cost of this to the eurozone will be 32.6 billion euros. A $40 billion payment to Greece is still on hold till Nov. 20, 2012. The cuts passed in parliament in November 2012 by the Samaras government will raise 17 billion euros over 4 years. The 2013 budget passed in parliament has cuts of 9.4 billion euros to salaries pensions and benefits, and raises the retirement age from 65 to 67. As of Nov. 2012 the bailout packages to Greece from the eurozone countries are at $240 billion.

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Yannis Stournaras, macroeconomics professor at the University of Athens, takes over as finance minister in Greece in June 2012 in the new administration of Antonis Samaras. He brings vast expertise and fresh ideas.

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Everything is moving in the wrong direction in terms of sustaining growth according to Nicholas Lardy of the Peterson Institute of International Economics. China's exports dependent economy will see a serious downturn as export markets in the USA and Europe dry up in 2009 as the deep recession takes shape. This could lead to growth rates going down to 6-7%.Other areas that propelled Chinese growth areinfrastructure investment and housing construction. Worried about rising housing prices the government last year out in place measures to dampen housing purchases, with tighter restrictions on second mortgages by banks and tighter lending for first mortgages. With house prices flat or falling now in Chinese cities many buyers are holding off for a better price in the future. Slower growth in housing will mean less demand for migrant labor and less demand for imports of cement and steel from other countries. China's lower imports of machinery, machine tools and heavy equipment for industry and infrastructure building will affect especially the German and Japanese economies. Germany has become the world's largest exporting nation in part by selling industrial equipment to China, its second most important market for machinery. In the first 7 months of 2008 these exports were still expanding at 20%. But these exports are likley now expanding at a rate of 10% and may slip to single digit growth in 2009, according to Olaf Wortmann, an economist with the VDMA engineering association. A good example of what is happening is the German manufacturers of textile machinery which derive 95% of their sales from overseas and mostly from China. These orders were down 42% in the first 7 months of 2008. With declining consumer demand in the US demand from China's exporting factories is declining. These figures and the accelerating slowdown in the US consumer markets suggest there will be a serious downturn in Chinese exports of textiles and other goods. The impact on German growth rates which are going below 2% in 2008 is to lead to 0% or declining growth in 2009. A similiar situation is ocurring for imports of heavy equipment from Japan. Orders of Japanese machine tools by China declined by 25% in September according to the Japan Machine Tool Builder's Association and Komatsu's shares have declined by 70% since their June peak. Part of the Chinese impact on global growth is mitigated by the fact that at market exchange rates China's economy is still only 6% of the world economy at market exchange rates and 10% at purchasing power parity. Chinese domestic consumer demand is $1.2 trillion for 2007 compared to the USA's $9.7 trillion, which also suggests how heavily China was dependent on the American consumer and how the missing American consumer will be hard to replace and the growth rates of 10-12% may be a thing of the past, with 6-7% being more realistic. ...

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Antonis Samaras visits Bavaria and meets with Christian Social Union leader Horst Seehofer, who offers his support to Greece's recovery efforts and plans a return visit to Greece. After the meeting, Seehofer said "today, we've turned over a new leaf," and Samaras said "I've received a lot of appreciation for our efforts."

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The NYT Editorial on June 2, 2009, says the Obama anti-foreclosure plan is woefully inadequate, and can't stop the wave of foreclosures. The administration's foreclosure plan that went into effect in March 2009, offers upto $75 billion in incentives to lenders to reduce loan payments for homeowners facing foreclosure. Lender participation is largely voluntary under the Obama plan, making it weak. Since March about 100,000 homeowners have been offered a modification according to the Treasury Department. This is a small dent in the plan's intent of preventing 4 million foreclosures. And it continues the Bush administration's apathy and lack of effective action to prevent foreclosures. The Mortgage Bankers Association reported that in the first quarter 2009 5.4 million mortgages were delinquent or facing foreclosure. There are 15.4 million "underwater" homeowners, those who have no equity in their homes, and with average person deeply in credit card and other debt, these people have little to fall back on if they lose their jobs or have a medical crisis. The simple arithmetic of these 15.4 and the 5.4 million, adding upto 20.8 million households, shows that anywhere near a fifth of American households are in deep financial trouble. The same numbers, or another fifth of American households, are approaching foreclosure. Drawing concentric circles of these homeowners inside a circle showing all American households, and seeing these concentric circles increasing in size with every quarter of job losses, one can clearly see why this is the biggest problem facing the economy. Job losses in January 598,000, February 681,000, March 699,000, April 539,000, totalling 2.5 million for Jan-April 2009, and 8.9 million working parttime. The underemployment rate at 15.8%. Till this foreclosure situation exacerbated by rising under employment is addressed, the credit easing and the small recovery thats been managed since December 2009, is like a mirage in the desert. A false sense of comfort. The NYT editorial makes the point that the foreclosures prevention efforts focus entirely on reducing monthly payments. Even here it falls short, in not reducing the payments enough, or programs not big enough in scope to address the millions of homeowners needing help. But an even bigger problem remains unaddressed, says the NYT, and this is not reducing the principal. An effective anti- foreclosure plan has to reduce the principal for the 15.4 million homeowners under water. This as Martin Feldstein has argued repeatedly in the oped pages of the WSJ since early 2008- the homeowners under water or approaching that situation have no incentive to hold onto their homes- has to be addressed by government taking responsibility for loan principal reduction in a carefully designed plan requiring participation of lenders. NYT points out that the mortgage industry has resisted taking this approach, and the Obama plan does not emphasize this important part of an effective plan to reduce foreclosures. By opposing this, the banks with the toxic mortgage assets and the government by going along with this, are shooting themselves in the foot. This makes any recovery at best weak, and more likely a false hope lacking fundamental support, foresight and vision....

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As Britain goes to general elections in May 2015, one of the issues in the election will be new referendum on membership in the European Union promised by prime minister David Cameron. Cameron has said he will negotiate a better deal for Britain in the EU and hold a referendum by 2017. The last referendum was in 1975, in which two thirds of voters supported membership in the EU. British disapproval of the EU has increased with immigration from newer EU members since the 2008 financial crisis, and increasing unemployment. Some recent polls show 42% voting to stay in the EU, and 39% opting out, suggesting a close vote. Negotiations for better terms mean treaty change, which would be opposed by France. Germany's Merkel also opposes changes on the immigration rules that do not allow free movement of labor. Other EU leaders see Cameron's moves on the EU being an effort to counter the UK Independence Party's push for EU exit, as the UKIP could draw Conservative right wing voters in the 2015 general election. ...

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The U.S. and the EU join together for stronger economic sanctions on Russia. The sanctions affecting large Russian banks ability to raise capital in financial markets are likely to affect the Russian economy. Russia was suspended for export credit and development finance. VTB Bank was one of three more Russian banks added to the list of banks with economic sanctions. The EU took similiar action against Russian state owned banks and imposed an arms embargo in July end 2014.

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U.S. Senator John McCain on how the U.S. can help Libya's newly elected democratic government.

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Interview with Honda CEO Takeo Fukui. In June Honda will rollout a new hydrogenpowered fuel cell vehicle called the FCX Clarity. Its powered with electricity produced by combining hydrogen and oxygen in batterylike fuel cells. Honda will have this vehicle available for lease this summer in California and aims to deliver about 200 of these cars by 2010. Fukui's attitude is refreshing when compared to that of other automakers when answering a question by John Murphy of the WSJ about why try to build a hydrogen car when the stations to power the cars do not exist yet. He tells Murphy if you asked were there any gas stations when Henry Ford came up with the Model T, there weren't any, lets build the cars first and the infrastructure will follow. And Honda is working on the technology that will make it possible to charge hydrogen into fuel-cell vehicles at home . He sees it happening first in California and some other states, and in Japan and Europe. And he sees it taking about 10 years to get some sort of infrastructure in place. Considering the long term nature of the demand side with the gradual inclusion of billions of people in China and India as well as Brazil and Russia into the world economy as well as people in other developing countries this is a solution that takes patient and focused development of technology which Honda is setting out to do. He does not see a safety issue in use of hydrogen vehicles as he is confident Honda can develop the expertise to handle the safety issue for hydrogen. What is his thinking on green vehicles? What happened to the Insight the first hybrid car that Honda introduced? The Insight was never intended to be a mass seller, only to establish Honda's record as having the best record in fuel efficiency. What is Honda doing in this area. Honda does see a problem in this area. Toyota he says developed a green image largely on the back of one car the Prius. Honda will come up in 2009 with a dedicated hybrid vehicle to match the Prius. And Honda is setting the bar high for this Honda hybrid, saying that his feeling that this model will have to overwhelm and overtake the Prius. He goes on to say that this is key for us. Honda he says will take on the challenge and compete with Toyota with its products, its technology, and its racing spirit. This gasoline-electric hybrid will be introduced early next year in the USA, Japan, and Europe, and it will be the first of 4 hybrid models Honda will introduce by 2015. Regarding price the company says it will be "affordable". Honda's goal is to sell 500,000 hybrid vehicles a year. Toyota aims to sell 1 million hybrid vehicles early in the next decade and is working on developing its own hydrogen fuel-cell vehicle. Is Honda developing electric cars? Takeo Fukui thinks the practical feasibility of the electric vehicle is very limited. The two biggest issues in his view being driving distance and recharging time. The FCX Clarity can be recharged in one minute, compared to the several hours for an electric vehicle. In his view the electric vehicles will be uselful only for restricted applications like golf carts. Nissan and General Motors are planning to launch electric vehicles. What is Honda's environmental strategy? Honda being a smaller company has to focus its resources wisely with strategic choices. His focus is on the hybrid as the core product, and after that comes fuel cell and clean diesel as the core products to tackle fuel eficiency and CO2 issues. Takeo has spent more than a decade on Honda's racing teams. He drives a CR-V and enjoys driving up and down the mountains, does not race but does get on Honda's test track once or twice a year. And what has he learned from all the years in racing. When he was fully engaged in the motorcycle racing teams he says the pressure was very high and if they did not do well they got bashed by managers and the media. And actually the results were disappointing for years and the teams kept losing. For hime the series of difficulties and challenges was something that he feels everyone should experience because in some ways he acquired wisdom and creativity to get through these experiences. This is some thing Honda and Fukui will need as they try to develop their own hybrid to take the lead from Toyota and come up with industry leading technology in tackling fuel efficiency and CO2 issues. His own approach to management? Two things he always keeps in mind are take time to keep up good communication with associates at work, and testing Honda's own products with his own hands. What does he think about the auto industry in 2008, is it a turning point? He says it has becom clear in 2008 that a company has to have the technology to deal with carborn dioxide and fuel efficiency issues. And its clear that smaller vehicles are more attractive than larger vehicles. And its possible he says that we may go back from automobiles to motorcycles. In fact in India Honda is promoting motorcycles in a big way, while Tata is developing the Nano for mass market, so Takeo is talking about something that Honda sees happening in some places. ...

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Russia is excluded for the second year for the G-7 Summit meeting of leaders in Berlin, in June 2015. The exclusion follows Russian intervention in Ukraine.