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The WSJ opinion section. WSJ points to the British plan as "a Plan -at Last", something that gets to the root of the crisis more than Paulson's plan to buy toxic assets. It will directly help to capitalize British Banks. The British govbernment will inject 50 billion pounds in return for preferred shares. It will guarantee 250 billion pounds in new debt issuance for those banks that participate in the recapitalization plan in order to secure their short term funding. And an additional $200 billion pounds is provided as additional liquidity through the Bank of England's Special Liquidity Scheme. And the British, the Fed, the Swedes, the Swiss, all lowered interest rates by half a point in a coordinated effort. Note that the British just as badly or even worse than the Americans binged and got drunk on debt and British banks were overleveraged to extreme. America is hardly the oonly scapegoat in this WSJ points out and reminds Brown that the five biggest British banks combined assets are about 4 times Britain's GDP. ...

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Just days after the collapse of Francis Scott Key Bridge on the outer harbor of Baltimore, a key part of Maryland's infrastructure and its industrial and shipping jobs, this report in the WSJ shows candidates will not be discussing how they will fix the many problems from infrastructure, to rebuilding manufacturing, and investing in education, healthcare. On the same day March 30, 2024 the WSJ headline was that many other large bridges of this size all over America could collapse including Chesapeake Bay, Verrazano Narrows and George Washington in NY-NJ, and Golden Gate, San Francisco-Oakland in California. On the same day an interview with Morris Chang of Taiwan Semiconductor showed 92% of advanced semiconductor manufacturing was controlled  by TSMC with much of it located in Taiwan and China, under a business model that means advanced technology manufacturing in the US that would take the place of the lower tech textile and other mills sent to China, would also be shipped out. Manufacturers in the US including Apple HP and others agreed, leaving American workers in the lurch, hitting communities all across America without manufacturing jobs and without hope. That model has been around since the 1990's. It is as if the American people, workers and families in the US were never consulted. That story is told alongside this article in Lyrarc.com ...

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Spain's Budget minister, Cristobal Montero, said the government would have a new credit line and provide an early infusion of $10 billion to aid financially troubled regions. Many of the regions are in such financial straits that they are unable to pay suppliers, and this is putting many small businesses in serious difficulties. Spain's prime minister Rajoy says the Spanish government needs to be concerned about what is happening in the regions, and that he would help regions as long as they meet their budget goals. Spain adopted a decentralized model after the years of the Franco dictatorship, and regions handle education, health care and social services, culture and providing services. With the economic crisis following years of free spending by the regions, the extent of this autonomy and the lack of budget controls is being called into question. Officials from regions such as Aragon, Valencia and Murcia have called on the federal government to play a bigger role.

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In Rural America in 2024, in places such as Wisconsin, people are looking for government to fund roads, library services and healthcare. It comes after decades of austerity in the state have starved funding for public services. This report looks at the city of Wausau, the seat of Marathon County, in north central Wisconsin, 90 miles northwest of Green Bay.

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The breakup fee of $4 billion and the $1 billion in "book value" of spectrum AT&T is giving to T-Mobile as part of the fee are part of the cost of the failed acquisition of T-Mobile. Other costs are that this puts AT&T at a significant disadvantage in relation to competitor Verizon, because Verizon is at least one year ahead in bringing out its next generation LTE network. By the end of 2011 Verizon's LTE network will reach 200 million Americans compared to AT&T LTE coverage of 70 million. Apple's next iPhone in 2012 will be an LTE model. AT&T's network congestion will mean it will have to do more capital spending than Verizon in the years ahead. Verizon has early mover advantages from its early investments in LTE network. From 2008 through the first 3 quarters of 2011, Verizon invested $29.3 billion in its wireless network compared to AT&T's $28.1 billion.

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India's 135 thermal power plants ahve just 4 days of coal stocks as of October 1, says the Financial Times, citing the power ministry. The power ministry has instructed plants to build up stocks. China is already facing a power shortage after coal fired plants were asked to cut down the use of coal to meet emissions targets. In early August coal fired plants in India had 13 days of stocks. With coal prices rising India did not buy enough coal to build up inventories. The manufacturing sector suffered a contraction in China for the first time since the pandemic started in 2020. China has instructed state owned energy companies to secure supplies of fossil fuel to prevent winter shortages. This further increased price of coal. Coal from Indonesia went up from $60 a ton in March to $200 a ton in September discouraging imports. The result is that with limited supplies and rising prices of coal India faces a perfect storm and power cutbacks as in China. ...

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Elbridge Colby memo led to slowing of US shipments to Ukraine in July 2025 just as Russia expanded its drone and missile attacks on Ukraine. Leading DJT to resume all shipments and override Colby as he supported shipment of Patriot systems to  Ukraine, with Germany willing to pay for the cost. Who is Colby? Colby 45 years, was made undersecretary of defense for policy in DJT second term. He is the grandson of a former CIA director, attended school in Japan where his father was working at an investment bank, and later at Yale Law School. Colby's view is for the US to focus on Asia, specifically on China and the defense of Taiwan, the Philippines and Japan. He does not favor Ukraine in NATO, sees Russia as a potential partner, and is a Republican who opposed the war in Iraq as a monumental waste of American resources. Some of his views are controversial such as focus only on China when US faces other threats around the world. Colby opposed an attack on Iran and even argued that US could manage a nuclear armed Iran which he has now retracted. ...

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Greg Smith resigns as executive director of Goldman Sachs on March 14, 2012. In an op-ed in the New York Times, Smith calls the culture at Goldman "toxic."

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Socializing and household contact is a big part of the problem as the government imposes a partial lockdown on the city of Birmingham, second largest in Britain. About 1.5 million people are affected with a ban on households making contact. Cases doubled in one week.

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How an Americano Roberto from Peru won election over Italian cardinal Parolin on May 9, 2025. Robert Francis Prevost was unknown to most of the Cardinals gathered from all over the world to elect Pope Francis's successor. What cardinals looked for was someone like Francis who was concerned about the poor, the homeless, and people struggling in society. They also wanted someone with managerial skills to run the vast organization that is the Vatican. The fastest growing part of the Catholic Church is in Latin America. The need was for someone who spoke Spanish and understood Latin America. Robert Francis Prevost met all these requirements in 2025. For most of its history, for 455 years, Popes were Italian. Pope Paul and Francis broke this tradition. Pope Leo XIV continues this effort to heal people's souls, and reach out to the marginalized and the struggling.

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Gasoline prices in Europe are much higher because of the gasoline tax. In many countries many of the taxes on gasoline are fixed and as a result it does not move up as crude prices go up. The proportion of the price at the pump which is the gasoline tax is larger in Europe which makes an increase in the underlying price of crude oil less keenly felt. Europe has invested in public transportation and Europeans use smaller cars which compensate for the higher price. Japan and S. Korea also follow the European practice of higher gasoline taxes which encourages conservation and the use of smaller cars.

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Retail and government hiring helped add 1.4 million jobs in the U.S. in August 2020. It has dropped from 15% in April. It was 3.5% in February before the pandemic. About 3.4 million individuals reported that their job loss was permanent an increase, while the number saying their job loss was temporary has declined to 6.2 million from 9.2 million in July.

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India is the top destination for companies in Japan investing overseas. India was cited as the most favorable location for investment by 49% of Japanese companies, Vietnam by 30%, and China by 28%. The survey of 534 companies was done by the JIPBC, Japan Bank for International Cooperation. India was favored because of the infrastructure building and growing economy, surge in consumer demand. 

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Indian regulators, the Commission for Air Quality Management, closed 6 of the 11 coal fired electricity plants within 100 kilometers radius of New Delhi, as it battles toxic smog that has covered the city for about 2 weeks. Schools and colleges are closed till further notice, and entry of trucks is restricted till November 21.