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Why the Straits of Hormuz are a critical path in the seas near Iran and Saudi Arabia through which much of the world's oil supplies flow. With the U.S. gaining oil sufficiency the straits of Hormuz oil supply lanes in the seas are critical to countries such as China, Japan and India which lack enough internal supplies of oil. Japan's prime minister mediated between the U.S. and Iran to keep the oil supplies lanes open and free of the conflicts and rivalry that have taken place in the region. After initially saying Iran was responsible for some tankers that caught fire, president Trump reversed himself saying that it was unintentional. The U.S. maintains oil sanctions on Iran but is careful not to worsen tensions further, and Iran suffering from the sanctions pursues a policy of trying to wait out the U.S. sanctions.

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The U.S. Senate votes 92-2 in near unanimity to pass a bill on opioid addiction, for prevention, treatment and recovery. This comes as the U.S. faces a opioid addiction crisis in 2016. It increases funding by 47% for the efforts, with funding approval to be voted on separately.

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A wind farm out at sea to start in 3 years, small renovation projects across France and Germany, a couple of billion dollars from the French government for home renovations- this kind of approach is considered completely unrealistic say EU legislators. One Danish legislator asks what is more unrealistic? Setting serious targets for conversion to renewable energy or depending on Putin's gas and oil?  These EU legislators are calling for aggressive action now. The European Commission set a 9% goal for energy savings by 2030, this has now been moved up to 13%. EU legislators are calling for 23% in savings by 2030. And even this may not be enough to meet the goals for climate change to prevent the disaster from climate change with fires and floods and heat waves that hurt agriculture and food supplies. A savings target of 19% is about the gas that runs 40% of the cars and trucks on American roads in 2021 or 214 million metric tons of oil. The French government has set aside 3 billion euros for comprehensive renovations of homes to save energy with a target of 300,000 homes in 2022. This is completely inadequate as it will cost 23 billion euros say experts on the Paris city council. Renovations are only running at 60,000 a year. A big part of the conversion in Europe is converting from gas heating to electric heating. France is boosting subsidies for new electric heat pump installations.   ...

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The media fails to give a clear complete picture of effects, context, concept behind tariffs and AI won't know. Effects on inflation- June inflation is 2.7% compared to May inflation of 2.4%. The central bank head, Fed chairman Powell has not cut rates to gauge the effect on inflation with new data. Powell says the US economy is strong and inflation remains low. US Market access fee-The US and overseas media including WSJ has not pointed out that the tariffs agreed to by Japan, European Union and South Korea of 15% are really not tariffs but a fee these countries and their business sectors in major industries such as autos and machinery, pay to access the US market. DJT, USTR Greer, Treasury's Bessent expect these companies to not increase prices. Fairness: US had 2.8% tariff on cars EU had 10% since 1980's. Rebates will go to some income groups. Rebates- In the one third of products in clothing, shoes etc of the $50 billion in tariffs for first half 2024 where about 5% price increase is passed on to consumers as shown in WSJ report this is likely offset by rebates to certain income groups. DJT says- “The big thing we want to do is pay down debt, but we’re thinking about a rebate. We have so much money coming in from tariffs that a little rebate for people of a certain income level might be really nice.”     ...

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A surge in retirements to 8000 staff retiring at Boeing is leading to hiring plans for 10,000 new employees at Boeing in 2023. Boeing hired 23,000 employees in 2022 as it battled attrition of employees and retirement.

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Research on the human genes by Novartis researcher Dr. Rappouli has helped develop a vaccine for Meningitis B. In a unique collaboration with Craig Venter, the scientist who decoded the human genome, Dr Rappouli, an Italian scientist working for Novartis unit, Chiron Corp., describes his research effort and results to Jeanne Whalen of the WSJ in 2007.

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The government of prime minister Narendra Modi defeats a non-confidence motion brought by Congress leader Rahul Gandhi. The motion was defeated with 325 votes against and 126 votes in favor.

Prime minister Modi used the moment in parliament to give a report card of his administration in preparation for the 2019 elections. 

In his speech Modi focussed on the work accomplished and the tasks ahead for economic development. He stated India was well on its way to become a $5 trillion economy. The opposition tactics to foment discontent in the country and organize factional interests would not detract the government from its singleminded focus on development, he said. Modi emphasized that the pace of economic development could not be accelerated in the first 2 years of the Modi administration because of the bad loans in the country's banking system, a problem stemming from bad practices and corruption in the previous administration.

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The story of the Pfizer BioNTech vaccine is the story of 2 chikdren of Turkish immigrants to Germany. Sahin the son of a engineer working at a Ford factory in Cologne, and Tureci the daughter of a surgeon working at a hospital in Mainz Germany. Sahin was born in 1965 on the Mediterranean coast in Iskerundun, Turkey and he went to Germany when he was 4 years old, his father being recruited in a new effort to rebuild Germany with foreign labour. Both are motivated by scientific research and the drive to come up with some method to tackle cancer for patients with new research and cures.  Both did their doctoral dissertation on experimental therapies at the Johannes-Gutenberg University of Mainz in Germany, and both joined the faculty there. Sahin spent years studying the mRNA , genetic instructions that can be delivered to the body to help it defend itself against viruses and other threats. Much of this mRNA research was already at an advanced stage in January 2020 when Sahin heard about the coronavirus in China. At that point he saw the potential of retargeting the mRNA research to tackling the coronavirus. By this time he already had his own company with over 200 million euros invested in it  by investors including Helmut Jeggle, now supervisory board chairman of BioNTech. This report says he sat down one Saturday, January 25, 2020 and working on his computer designed the template for 10 possible coronavirus vaccines, one of which would become BNT162b2, the vaccine now approved in Britain. On the same day he told a surprised Jettle that he would refocus the company on the new virus that had not yet hit Europe. Shain he says cited the Hong Kong flu that claimed 4 million lives. Why Pfizer. Pfizer had already been working with BioNTech on a new flu vaccine based on mRNA technology. A cooperation deal was signed with Pfizer in March for organizing clinical trials, manufacture globally, and distribute the vaccine. BioNTech then acquired a U.S. company and a German pharmaceutical factory in Germany. ...

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This report on Danish wind energy company Orsted, looks at the journey of the largest developer of wind energy in the world from a company sending natural gas from North Sea to Europe to a joint developer with Denmark's Vestas of offshore wind farms. Last year Orsted, pronounced Ehrr-sted in Danish for the O and named after a Danish scientist, decided to invest $57 billion in offshore wind farms by 2027. It was not easy and the path required a bold vision and bold action to invest in wind energy for the long term even as debt piled up from losses in natural gas competing with coal, climate change committments were not yet strong, subsidies were required to make wind energy competitive, and debt was piling up. It would take a decade of hard work and technological innovation to produce wind energy that could outcompete coal and natural gas on cost without subsidies. The year is 2009 with the Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen. The predecessor company to Orsted was losing money in natural gas with lower cost coal energy generation in Europe at the time. Yet the mood was changing governments were willing to invest in renewables. In 2012 a new CEO Paulsen did a review of 12 businesses of this Danish energy company and decided wind energy was the only one with long term prospects. The Copenhagen Climate Change Conference created new awareness for the need to come up with a long term solution for energy that has no negative health effects and is renewable. That Conference set a goal of 20% for renewable energy by 2020 in the total mix for Europe up from 14%. Paulsen saw an opportunity in the crisis at the company then called Danish Oil and Natural Gas. The new company was called Orsted and the old divisions in fossil energy were sold to invest in wind farms offshore. The way Paulsen saw the situation was that the company had to take radical action whether it wanted to do so or not. By 2012 Danish pension funds were investing in large offshore wind farms of Orsted, taking a stake of as much as 50% in the Nysted wind farm. The Danish government which owned 80% of Orsted thought its projects were risky. Hard work with Vestas which builds the turbines in Denmark paid off in developing a huge new turbine that would bring costs down 65% comparing 2020 with 2012.  In 2018 the European Union was spending about 92 billion euros or $112 billion on energy subsidies including to wind farms. Britain also heavily subsidized offshore wind farms such as Hornsea 1 at about $198 a megawatt hour for 15 years double the electricity price in recent years. Windy conditions and shallow waters in the North Sea were favorable. Technology was being developed with Vestas which would reduce the cost each year. By 2016 Orsted was listed in Copenhagen. The remaining oil and gas business was then sold for $1 billion. The returns are less in wind than coal and natural gas- about 7-8% a year but the big thing is that there is certainty in this compared to coal and natural gas which are volatile and uncertain. The lesson companies are learning in renewables is that with solar and wind technology can. bring down costs, a lot of hard work and creative work lies ahead, that crisis can be turned into opportunity for companies that can be focussed enough to produce results. ...

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Ways in which the war is affecting young men in Ukraine ages 18-23 years. Boys were not allowed to leave the country when they reached 18 leading to boys leaving the coutnry. Now the age is changed from 18 years to 23 years. There are more older people at the front in Ukraine.

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Paul Krugman points out in the NYT that September 2022 high inflation numbers for core inflation excluding energy and food of 6.6% on annualized basis, is still not a good way to measure actual inflation. This is because housing costs as measured by the core inflation index used by the Labor Department are represented by housing rental costs. The rental costs have a time lag in this index and after a sharp spike are now cooling off. Add to this slowing economies and recessions in European economies and the situation suggests that the economy and inflation may be moderating more than expected. Additional factors are that the effects of sharp prior 2 increases in interest rates by the Fed of 0.75% and a third of 0.75% expected soon, are still not fully realized in the economy. This view was also expressed by experts in the WSJ. It was widely perceived that the high inflation that we are seeing is a result of temporary factors such as the war in Ukraine, food and oil supply constraints, supply chain bottlenecks, new adjustments to manufacturing at home after covid. As these factors ease and after the Fed's action to raise interest rates, slowing economies in Europe adjusting to climate change actions,  the moderating effects on the economy of the costs in switching to renewable energy also a factor, this high inflation has prospects of moderating. The successful switch to renewables particularly solar, and better agricultural practices, could set along term trajectory of moderate inflation in costs of energy and food supplies.  ...

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North Korea launched a missile that landed within 125 miles of Japan's northwest coast. The Japanese Defense Ministry stated the additional time to reach the Japanese shoreline was 20-30 seconds. North Korea said it did this to protest the U.S. and South Korea setting up a THAAD, Terminal High Altitude Area Defense System, about 200 miles southeast of Seoul to intercept North Korean missiles. Japanese prime minister Shinzo Abe reshuffled his cabinet and appointed Tomomi Inada, a conservative who supports revision of the Japanese constitution to improve Japanese capabilities for defense. She is the second woman to take up the defense ministry position after the newly elected Tokyo governor, Yuriko Koike.

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Seib points out why the current political landscape with the popularity of Trump and Sanders reflects demographic, economc and social changes in America compared to when Geroge H.W. Bush won the election in 1988 and Bill Clinton won in 1992. The Republican party is more populist, with older Americans, more Southern and conservative, making it harder for Jeb Bush or Wall Street backed candidates. The Democratic Party more liberal, more popular on both the east and west coast of the U.S., with younger Americans, diverse demographic groups, making it harder for Hillary Clinton as an establishment candidate. A Journal/NBC poll of Oct. 2015 shows 28% of Republicans describing their views as very conservative, and 26% of Democrats saying they are very liberal. Yet there is another aspect that will show up once the primaries are over. And this is the steady group of somewhat conservative and moderate combined in the Republican Party of 64%, and the steady group of somewhat liberal and moderate in the Democratic Party of 62% in the 2015 Journal/NBC poll. The moderates are up from 26% in the above 1990 poll to 31% in the 2015 poll for the Republican Party, and from 26% to 33% in the Democratic Party. So that one sees about a quarter of people polled in each party pushing for fringe views and a countervailing trend for moderate or close to moderate views with about two thirds support in the 2015 Journal/NBC poll for each party....

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The Brazilian goalkeeper for Jurgen Klopp's  Liverpool team does something few goalkeepers have ever done and a first in Liverpool's 129 year history. He scored a header goal in the 95th minute against West Brom, keeping Liverpool's Champion's League hopes alive.