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Marco Rubio speaks for the US with profound convictions and long experience in the Florida legislature and the US Senate, and as akey member of the DJT administration. In his speech in Munich at the MSC he recalls his grandparents being from Piedmeont Sardinia in Italy and from Sevilla in Spain. He talks proudly of his Spanish and Italian heritage, of America founded by European settlers. For Europe this is a speech that shows America is profoundly part of Western Civilization that started in Europe. Here are some parts of the speech and Rubio's call for America and Europe to respond strongly to the mistakes in migration and deindustrialization that have hurt the people of Europe and America, with deeply felt negative consequences. "That infamous wall that had cleaved this nation into two came down, and with it an evil empire, and the East and West became one again.  But the euphoria of this triumph led us to a dangerous delusion:  that we had entered, quote, “the end of history;” that every nation would now be a liberal democracy; that the ties formed by trade and by commerce alone would now replace nationhood; that the rules-based global order – an overused term – would now replace the national interest; and that we would now live in a world without borders where everyone became a citizen of the world.  This was a foolish idea that ignored both human nature and it ignored the lessons of over 5,000 years of recorded human history.  And it has cost us dearly.  In this delusion, we embraced a dogmatic vision of free and unfettered trade, even as some nations protected their economies and subsidized their companies to systematically undercut ours – shuttering our plants, resulting in large parts of our societies being deindustrialized, shipping millions of working and middle-class jobs overseas, and handing control of our critical supply chains to both adversaries and rivals.  We increasingly outsourced our sovereignty to international institutions while many nations invested in massive welfare states at the cost of maintaining the ability to defend themselves.  This, even as other countries have invested in the most rapid military buildup in all of human history and have not hesitated to use hard power to pursue their own interests.  To appease a climate cult, we have imposed energy policies on ourselves that are impoverishing our people, even as our competitors exploit oil and coal and natural gas and anything else – not just to power their economies, but to use as leverage against our own.  And in a pursuit of a world without borders, we opened our doors to an unprecedented wave of mass migration that threatens the cohesion of our societies, the continuity of our culture, and the future of our people.  We made these mistakes together, and now, together, we owe it to our people to face those facts and to move forward, to rebuild.  Under President Trump, the United States of America will once again take on the task of renewal and restoration, driven by a vision of a future as proud, as sovereign, and as vital as our civilization’s past.  And while we are prepared, if necessary, to do this alone, it is our preference and it is our hope to do this together with you, our friends here in Europe.  For the United States and Europe, we belong together.  America was founded 250 years ago, but the roots began here on this continent long before.  The man who settled and built the nation of my birth arrived on our shores carrying the memories and the traditions and the Christian faith of their ancestors as a sacred inheritance, an unbreakable link between the old world and the new.  We are part of one civilization – Western civilization.  We are bound to one another by the deepest bonds that nations could share, forged by centuries of shared history, Christian faith, culture, heritage, language, ancestry, and the sacrifices our forefathers made together for the common civilization to which we have fallen heir. And so this is why we Americans may sometimes come off as a little direct and urgent in our counsel.  This is why President Trump demands seriousness and reciprocity from our friends here in Europe.  The reason why, my friends, is because we care deeply.  We care deeply about your future and ours.  And if at times we disagree, our disagreements come from our profound sense of concern about a Europe with which we are connected – not just economically, not just militarily.  We are connected spiritually and we are connected culturally.  We want Europe to be strong.  We believe that Europe must survive, because the two great wars of the last century serve for us as history’s constant reminder that ultimately, our destiny is and will always be intertwined with yours, because we know – (applause) – because we know that the fate of Europe will never be irrelevant to our own.  National security, which this conference is largely about, is not merely series of technical questions – how much we spend on defense or where, how we deploy it, these are important questions.  They are.  But they are not the fundamental one.  The fundamental question we must answer at the outset is what exactly are we defending, because armies do not fight for abstractions.  Armies fight for a people; armies fight for a nation.  Armies fight for a way of life.  And that is what we are defending: a great civilization that has every reason to be proud of its history, confident of its future, and aims to always be the master of its own economic and political destiny. It was here in Europe where the ideas that planted the seeds of liberty that changed the world were born.  It was here in Europe where the world – which gave the world the rule of law, the universities, and the scientific revolution.  It was this continent that produced the genius of Mozart and Beethoven, of Dante and Shakespeare, of Michelangelo and Da Vinci, of the Beatles and the Rolling Stones.  And this is the place where the vaulted ceilings of the Sistine Chapel and the towering spires of the great cathedral in Cologne, they testify not just to the greatness of our past or to a faith in God that inspired these marvels.  They foreshadow the wonders that await us in our future.  But only if we are unapologetic in our heritage and proud of this common inheritance can we together begin the work of envisioning and shaping our economic and our political future. Deindustrialization was not inevitable.  It was a conscious policy choice, a decades-long economic undertaking that stripped our nations of their wealth, of their productive capacity, and of their independence.  And the loss of our supply chain sovereignty was not a function of a prosperous and healthy system of global trade.  It was foolish.  It was a foolish but voluntary transformation of our economy that left us dependent on others for our needs and dangerously vulnerable to crisis. Mass migration is not, was not, isn’t some fringe concern of little consequence.  It was and continues to be a crisis which is transforming and destabilizing societies all across the West.  Together we can reindustrialize our economies and rebuild our capacity to defend our people.  But the work of this new alliance should not be focused just on military cooperation and reclaiming the industries of the past.  It should also be focused on, together, advancing our mutual interests and new frontiers, unshackling our ingenuity, our creativity, and the dynamic spirit to build a new Western century.  Commercial space travel and cutting-edge artificial intelligence; industrial automation and flex manufacturing; creating a Western supply chain for critical minerals not vulnerable to extortion from other powers; and a unified effort to compete for market share in the economies of the Global South.  Together we can not only take back control of our own industries and supply chains – we can prosper in the areas that will define the 21st century." ...

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Even with the housing industry decline in Spain the country is not expected to be hit with a serious economic dowturn as overall housing debt is relatively low and banks are still healthy.

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As the deadline of July 22 approaches for the 160,000 members of the UK Conservative Party to elect a leader, former Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson and the current Foreign Secretary Jeremy Hunt are running for the leadership position. Boris Johnson has 68% member support with Hunt at 23%, according to YouGov survey. Both candidates are in favor of Britain leaving the European Union without an agreement. Hunt has stated he would cancel leave for Britain's 16,000 civil servants in August to prepare for the departure of Britain from the EU by October 31.  Only 27% of Conservative Party members believe Mr. Hunt can do the preparation needed for an abrupt exit after 45 years of economic integration with the European Union. By contrast 90% of members think Johnson would do the preparation needed. Preparation is needed because of food and medical supplies trucks and in flights awaiting customs at border points. The result could be chaotic without adequate preparation. Under a Johnson government many ministers would leave the government including Mr. Hammond who runs the finance ministry. He is expected to join rebel ranks in the Conservative Party that does not think an abrupt exit like this is good for Britain. If these members in the House of Commons join Labour party members they could vote to block this from happening. Britain's opposition Labour Party led by Jeremy Corbyn has finally decided to call for a second referendum if Johnson pushes to leave the EU abruptly, and to campaign wholeheartedly this time for staying inside the EU. During the last referendum Labour leaders did not push hard for Remain, and David Cameron as prime minister and head of the Conservatives proved to be a weak and ineffective leader using the promise of a referendum as a ploy to win votes for the Conservatives in an earlier election and then finding himself stuck with promises made in the election with his party's right wing led by Johnson. Years of austerity policies promoted by Germany in the EU after a flawed entry of southern European countries with faulty not transparent finances such as Greece too early  into the eurozone had soured Britons on the EU. The friendly migration policies of German leader Merkel for economic as well as war torn country migrants from North Africa finally not just soured Germans on Merkel policies but also soured British working class families struggling to make ends meet and seeing migration as taking British resources that were needed at home. This has split most of Europe including Britain along lines of the major cities and the rural areas plus smaller towns, and in Eastern Europe, East Germany region along the lines of the old Soviet bloc countries which with deeply conservative thinking do not favor such migration policies. These divisive changes have taken place over along period of decades and will take time to heal through economic recovery and a fairer distribution of wealth, better investment in infrastructure, health, education, public services, neglected during the Tech driven flawed investment diversion of economic resources. Yet the hope of this type of change if grasped by Britons as well as Europeans could bring new life and revive the vision of a Europe with shared benefits for all Europeans, not just a French-German project. For this to happen new leaders have to rise to the challenge inside Britain and the rest of Europe.      ...

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Dan Balz says former prime minister Blair's policies in Britain (1997-2007) closely followed the policies of moving to centrist positions of U.S. president Clinton, with Blair's election in 1997 following Clinton's wins in 1992 and 1996. Clinton followed the Reagan years and Blair the Thatcher years in government, in modifying the early postwar ideas about the economy. The election of Corbyn by 59.5% of the vote of Labor party members, exceeds the 57% achieved by Blair in 1994. The opposing candidates did very poorly. Yvette Cooper, who most resembled Blair's positions was seen as waffling on issues by not taking clear positions. She lost badly with 4.5% of the vote, showing that something significantly has changed with the the deep recession following the 2008 financial crisis, and the recovery through years of austerity policies under Cameron's Conservative government. Balz's view is that this is likely to bring up the same debate in the Democratic party- Corbyn proposes a national investment bank for large investments in education, health services and infrastructure, and a reversal of Labor policies introducing fees for college education to increase opportunity. Sanders has not proposed a national investment bank, but says he would invest in education ( including reversing the spiralling education costs), health services, infrastructure, and other areas. Hillary Clinton has made the issue of upward mobility for the middle and working class a central issue in her campaign, but lacks the authenticity claimed by Sanders, who has tapped into anti-establishment feeling following the lack of recovery in wages under 7 years of the Democratic party government in the U.S. In this context Jeb Bush has also stated at the 2013 CPAC conference that social and economic mobility is the central issue of our times, only he would approach it by giving business incentives to increase business investment to create jobs and increase wages; and by adopting a tax code that would be also fair to the middle and working class....

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Simon Nixon points out the problems investors had with UBS before the Oct 2012 decision to drastically reduce the size of the investment banking operations. UBS had three fourths of its capital engaged in investment banking earning only about 5% return. Private bank and wealth management businesses earned far better returns of 25%-40%. Under the new plan core Tier 1 ratio on a fully applied Basel III basis would be 13% in 2014. And return on equity under CEO Ermotti's plan would increase to over 15% by 2015. UBS would put emphasis on the private bank and wealth management businesses under the new plan and shrink the investment banking operations with large job cuts.

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PM makes a point at G7- should not the 1.4 billion people of India most of whom are poor have the same access to energy as the people in the rich countries of the G7? It is to ensure this access to energy for the over 1 billion people in India that India has sourced oil from all countries when geopolitical tensions have made the price of oil to jump to new highs. Modi told a session at the G7 meetings- "All of you will also agree with this that energy access should not be the right of the rich only- a poor family also has the same right to energy. And today when energy prices are sky high due to geopolitical tensions, it is more important to remember this thing." Modi said that it was by "taking inspiration from this principle" that "we delivered LED bulbs and cooking gas door to door in India and showed that millions of tons of carbon emissions can be saved while ensuring energy for the poor." Never before in history has this been done on this scale as hundreds of millions of women have benefitted in poor areas where cooking was done by burning wood, and electricity did not exist. Water by tap water in every home, cooking gas, and electricity are now within the reach of every family in India.  Has G7 even thought of these things? And of the scale of the challenge that is being met and the future challenges for climate, technology and health that are being tackled on an unprecedented scale? ...

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The 2016 primaries with Sanders and Trump have brought to the forefront voter dissatisfaction with the agenda of both parties, especially so for Republicans with the lack of specifics and personality driven campaign of frontrunner Trump. On a whole host of issues from poverty, wages and inequality, regulatory reform, to trade, borders, security, ISIS, both parties are facing questions from voters. Particularly the Republicans who have lacked specifics during the two terms of the Democratic Obama administration with a divided Republican Congress, and the risks for Republicans running for Congress under frontrunners Trump or Cruz who have provided few details on their agenda. The Agenda project of Ryan will have about 25 meetings and prepared specific agenda, including white papers and legislation, that would give Republicans hope to run on positive proposals that are placed before the Republican Convention in Cleveland. Chairmen of House standing committees were assigned 6 areas- health care, taxes, national security, regulatory reform, poverty, and Congress reasserting constitutional authority. Ryan told the Ethics and Public Policy Center on April 19, 2016- "A lot of people don't like conservatism as they know it. For too many people Republicans seem to be caught in a time warp. They're thinking, 'We don't control our borders. Wages are going nowhere. College and healthcare keep getting expensive. ISIS continues to spread. And what are Republicans going to do about it?' So we need to adapt our policies to meet the challenges of the 21st century."...

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Mexico's Congress passes changes to the constitution and new oil legislation which will allow foreign companies to compete with state owned Pemex. Challenges remain in the form of creating transparent regulators to implement the legislation, and ensuring that the benefits of the increased investment in the oil industry benefit ordinary Mexicans through a higher growth rate, using cheaper natural gas to support the manufacturing sector, and additional revenues from the increased oil and gas production tha support health, education and infrastructure development.

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India European Union Trade Deal - huge potential for EU and India for 2 billion people size markets, new manufacturing hubs, and advanced scientific + technological cooperation. Timing is critical. From the first term of DJT 2016-2020 it became clear that the supply chain concentration in China was a serious error for America and Europe. Modi came into manage the federal government in India in 2014- that first phase was to tackle the basic problems in health care sanitation and road infrastructure, agriculture. By the second term of DJT Europe had realized something had to be done to reduce concentration of trade  supply chains in China. Two things had to happen to bring India and EU together. The Ukraine War and China's indirect participation on the side of Russia, the change in administration from Merkel to SPD's Schulz,  and in 2026 to Merz and the CDU created a new awareness of the need for EU and India to come together. Yet Scholz SPD hung onto the special trade relationship even in the face of the Ukraine war and China's shift when it allowed the port of Hamburg stake taken by China to be retained. Something had to happen to jerk Germany and with it the EU out of its inability to shift towards India. Merz took this step in 2026 as the relationship with China soured over Ukraine war and the grasp of the dangers of overconcentration of the China relationship with Germany that Merkel had created. On the other side Modi had to get India's logistics, road and rail networks, ports ready for such a trade relationship where goods could be quickly shipped into and out of India. Modi worked on these investments on a rapid basis in his second and third terms. India had to offer stability in the relationship. This meant winning elections to set up state governments in key states such as Maharashtra for Bombay (Mumbai) region, Delhi capital region, and Bihar/ Orissa (Patna region northeast), Rajasthan (Jaipur northwest region), local city governments in Bombay (Mumbai) region and in the south in Andhra (Vizag region) + Trivandrum (Kerala). The combination of federal and state and city governments working in unison plus logistics and transportation, put India in contention for the role of a size and magnitude that would make a difference for Europe in its relations with China and Russia. That necessity was now fulfilled and in place. Merz and Modi, seized the chance at the kite festival in Gujarat's Ahmedabad, with a vist to the Sabarmati Ashram of modern India's founder Mohandas Gandhiji. Von Der Leyen also from CDU now joins the former premier of Portugal Antonio de Costa as heads of EU to attend the Republic Day parade celebrations in New Delhi on January 26. Nothing happened by chance. It took the hard work that in Robert Frost's words in Mowing ( "the fact is the sweetest dream that labor knows my long scythe whispered, for the earnest love that laid the swale in rows"). Japan plunged headlong into imperial ambitions after its modernization, China has ambitions under its Communist/ Markets system, India as the homeland of the Buddha and the Buddhist civilization of China, Japan and Indochina, and with its special place for Mohandas Gandhiji brings the European civilization in connection with a civilization that is just as old and advanced as the European in its philosophical and religious foundations with practice in real life, and not likely to flounder on the rocks as the Japanese and Chinese expansionist ambition based ideas. And once again with Robert Frost in- Putting in the Seed in Springtime, for Merz, Leyen, Da Costa, and for Gandhi and Modi - "On through the watching for that early birth when just as the soil tarnishes with weed, The sturdy seedling with arched body comes shouldering its way and shedding the earth crumbs."     ...

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Efforts in 2014 by Jizhong Energy Company to reduce pollution in the city of Xingtai, population 7.6 million, by closing down the worst polluting plants and installing new equipment. The World Bank put the cost of pollution, including cancer and other health problems, at 9% of gross national income in 2009. The Ministry of Environmental Protection estimates 3.5% of GDP as the cost of pollution in 2010. Xingtai's pollution levels have been recorded by air quality monitors at as high as 30 times China's national standard. Government figures show the PM2.5 in the city's air is 150 micrograms per cubic meter over the last 12 months, more than 4 times the national standard. To get some idea what this means, consider that Fresno, California, with the highest pollution level in the U.S. had PM2.5 level of 18 micrograms per cubic meter. To show it is serious the central government requires the city to post pollution figures online, down to individual smokestacks and exhaust ports.

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The Congressional Budget Office analysis of the Republican healthcare plan advocated by Mr. McConnell, Senate Majority leader, is that it would add 22 million uninsured if implemented. That plan ran into opposition from Republican Senators Collins, Capito, Murkowski, Paul, and Moran, and lacked enough support in the Senate. All Democrats opposed it and with the thin majority Republicans were divided. By taking away some benefits given under the existing Affordable Care Act the plan hurt the elderly and low income people, making some Republicans listen to their constituents in home districts and not the Republican leadership. The NYT profiled two in particular who astonishingly in a sign of today's strange politics were the only ones publicly holding townhall type meetings to hear the views of people in their voting districts- Susan Collins of Maine and Jerry Moran of Kansas. Both senators were listening to rural communities and Moran stated his opposition with the words- "I am a product of rural Kansas." With it the nation takes a breather and the message goes out that it is best to listen first and then to seek middle ground, not do what both parties Democrats and Republicans did in 2009 and 2017- rush serious legislation through without support across party lines and without serious discussion.   ...

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Coy cites Paul Krugman's Willie Coyote scenario for the dollar, where the famous character runs off a cliff, but starts to fall only when he starts to look down. One foreign exchange expert says there is a 40% chance of the dollar falling into a crisis point. Two forces are working in that direction. Near zero rates in the USA is making it a speculative play to borrow dollars cheaply, and then sell them to buy other currencies where stocks and bonds yield higher returns. The other is that experts feel that the US may eventually make its huge debt affordable by devaluing its currency. David Malpass does not see rising import prices and inflation as healthy for the US economy. He says the fall of the dollar in the 1980's gave the Japanese the buying power to strengthen their automakers. Coy also sees the risk of a major failure of a financial institution, as a possibility, if it made a bet that made it vulnerable to a falling dollar. At this point 88% of derivatives credit risk exposure in the USA is residing in 5 banks in the second quarter in 2009....

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The government criteria for injecting funds into banks discourage lending to banks that are not healthy and unlikely to survive, considering this a poor use of taxpayer funds. This will lead to fewer and healthier banks.

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President Goodluck Jonathan as "Mr. Clean" aroused many of the same hopes now aroused by the election of Buhari as president of Nigeria. Under Goodluck Jonathan Nigeria's foreign reserves declined from $50 billion to $33 billion, and there is $1 billion in the sovereign wealth fund. About $20 billion in pilfering of state funds was reported by the Central Bank of Nigeria, but no action was taken by Jonathan. Indians may pride themselves on a better performance, yet prime minister Singh of India, seen as "Mr. Clean," allowed auctioning of telecom licenses in the second term, that had to be cancelled because of corruption. Throughout emerging markets not just in oil producing countries, poverty remains entrenched, because funds that should go into infrastructure and services are misused, which creates a disincentive for foreign investment, further adding to the problems in these countries. India and Nigeria are the two fastest growing countries in the planet, and the unspoken fear is that the demographic dividend with so many young people will be wasted by corrupt and inefficient management of the economy and resources of the two countries. The time lost in the last years of the Singh administration and the four years of the Jonathan administration will never be regained, the hopes of millions of young people are dashed again and again, and the goodwill of Europe and the U.S. eager to participate with the latest technologies in the development of the two countries, as they have done in China, is wasted....

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Friedman on the $43 billion infrastructure he saw in China and the crumbling infrastructure in New York City and driving from dilapidated La Guardia airport in New York city into the city vs the new Shanghai airport and the magnetic levitation trains into Shanghai. He says don't forget that they are mere snapshots. And he is very aware that you go 100 milews outside Beijing and you find a poor developing country. So which is the real China, no easy answers. Give credit to their dedication and all the hard work and the motivation and planning to Chinabut still ask the questions about what we should do here in America and what countries like India have to ask what they should do and go about doing it. China will have its own questions and problems to think about too as it has to figure out what their best allocation of capital will be, what their policies should be from the birth rate and demographic changes, to the environment, and to ways to bring the rest of the country and farmers into the picture and see that the gains from now on reflect the imbalances in growth. The country building the latest infrastructure will always have the latest infrastructure and that will be the next country around the corner with the capital and energy to do it, the USA or India or Russia or some other country. The real progress is in the quality of life, of health and the resources for living productive healthy lives for most of the inhabitants of any country or region and that goes beyond politics or nationalism or rivalries or vested interests of groups of people, as it depends on learning from the best that every productive mind anywhere in the world or any productive place anywhere in the world has to offer. And the thing about this is its never a goal only because in a true sense the road well travelled is the destination for this kind of progress. ...

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Dependence on China increased during the Merkel years to extreme levels. A EU survey shown in this DW.com report shows that of 137 products and services deemed critical, including fields such as renewable energy and health, almost 50% are supplied by China and only 3% by Russia. German foreign takeover laws and acquisition laws are being upgraded only now after years of China's investment in German technology and critical infrastructure  companies. The Merkel administration took a lax approach to protecting German technology and critical infrastructure. A similar situation existed with the Obama administration in the US. New regulations give the German government a veto in all critical mergers and acquisitions. This DW.com report says that today Germany's protected sectors include energy and telecommunications, medical technology, artificial intelligence. The problems  with the previous approach in the Merkel years that showed a complete disregard for protecting vital technologies was that the Economy Ministry in 2016 was not able to stop the full takeover of the flagship German robotics company KuKa by a Chinese manufacturer of dishwashers and refrigerators Midea. In 2018 a Chinese state electric utility company SGCC sought to get a 20% stake in 50Hertz a German electric grid operator which was turned back. Only now with the entry of the Greens under Habeck and Baerbock in government has Germany adopted a clear policy of effective action to protect German technology and critical infrastructure companies. ...

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This report in NYT looks at the Barbados debt crisis. Barbados spends 55% of its budget to pay interest on debt (servicing the debt). That leaves about 5% for health and climate change. Years of borrowing that ignored basic rules of financing have created serious problems that were compounded by the pandemic and hurricanes. This report shows that the total deb of Barbados was not known to the central bank. Borrowing was approved at exorbitant interest rates. One loan with Credit Suisse for $150 million is shown here with interest rates that lead it to become a catastrophic amount owed. Many such loans without any checks and supervision of total loans taken, lack of financial prudence rules followed, lack of transparency and alerts on borrowing and spending tend to create this kind of situation in many poor countries. About two thirds of developing countries are in this situation owing one third of their budget for debt service or paying interest on the loan. The situation is unstable to begin with. Then on comes along a hurricane or natural disaster such as the pandemic and the unstable situation becomes a catastrophe. Sri Lanka, Pakistan, the Caribbean nations, nations in Africa, face debt crises that are getting worse. It is not inevitable or destiny for nations today, consider the examples of large nations such as Japan, China, South Korea and India, Malaysia, Indonesia, and one can see that development finance can be prudent and responsible, so that situations such as the pandemic can be handled without going into disarray. ...

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Happiness in Finland may be more about expectations for contentment being more reasonable, says this report on Finland. Colston and Michaels talk to Finns in different parts of the country to get a sense of how Finns look at life and why the country is rated so highly on a happiness index put out by the UN Sustainable Development Solutions Network. For one thing Finland has a small homogenous population of 5 million people spread out over a vast densely forested region with a strong sense of identity and mutual help. It is also a technologically advanced country. This has enable Finland to maintain a state that provides an extraordinary amount of public services in education, health care, culture, that promote a sense of well being. Its participation in winter and other sports and sports facilities open to all also factor into this. This is true also of Denmark with 5 million people another country in the same region. Consider that the greater Mumbai region alone has over 20 million people, Shanghai 29 million and Tokyo 37 million. Just the pressure on space in homes is different. The long dark winters have an impact for Finns yet the people have adapted with a persevering quality that helps them deal with it. And having a peculiar Nordic version of mindfulness, a Buddhist quality, that brings contentment by understanding the nature of happiness which is mixed with tinge of sadness. Qualities that are shared throughout the Nordic region including Sweden.   ...

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The British government is considering effectively preventing two households from meeting indoors by limiting the number of people meeting indoors to 6 from the 30 now in place. Experts believe a second wave of infections is a distinct possibility if nothing is done especially with higher infections among younger people in Europe after reopening. People are seen as relaxing too much. Young people in Spain and other European countries are a big part of the problem today. In Germany the incidence of cases for 15-24 years is fifteen times the number of cases for 70-79 years in the first week of September, showing how completely reversed the situation has become with young people acting as spreaders of the pandemic. The incidence of new cases is 30 per 100,000 in Germany for 15-24 years compared to just 2 for the 70-79 years. In Berlin it is as high as 43 for 15-24 years and the Health Minister is concerned because in contrast to local groups these individuals can spread it throughout Berlin.  School reopenings in Europe and in America are a distinct danger so that colleges in the U.S are switching back to remote learning because of improper behaviour of young people including parties and gatherings. Tougher restrictions are seen as necessary to get people to pay attention to social distancing that was practiced earlier in April. This is true of Europe, America, and Asia. Even curfews are now being considered. ...

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This report in WSJ shows what offices would look like in a coronavirus economic reopening. Till a vaccine is developed in about one year from now what will the gradual reopening look like?   It shows a cafeteria at a company in Seoul with plastic shields separating each person, the Amsterdam office concept of six foot distancing offices at Cushman & Wakefield. This real estate company manages 800 million square feet in China real estate. It has developed a 300 page manual on safely reopening offices with every detail possible. Toyota plants will run at slower speeds because of large drop in demand, with plants reconfigured to maintain social distancing. Many companies are doing this now when it is easier to do without people. Protocols such as onsite health screenings are being integrated. A Knotel app  will add features for office tenants that gives employers the option to track some employee movements and trace their contacts to prevent illness. For sports and event venues the challenge is sanitation and cleanliness. Adding janitorial cleaning shifts and making food grab and go, cashless transactions and protective shields. Schools and colleges face a challenge of how many students to let in, and how many to seat and how, dorms with one room one student, and so on. One college in Maine is planning for thinning the students on campus, rotating students with shorter term modules, more online instruction.  ...

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How a deficiency in trust is affecting the US effort to vaccinate its whole population in 2021. The US government took steps early to build vaccine supplies, and was one of the first countries with the UK to begin its vaccination drive. Then after 6 months something went wrong. The deficiency in trust led to about 80 million people many of them young, to avoid getting vaccinated. US president Biden said the country was losing patience with these people. He setup a vaccine mandate and required all employees in private sector in companies with more than 100 employees to get vaccinated. This applied to about two thirds of American workers. All federal government workers were also required to get vaccinated. Yet even after the vaccine mandate the number of vaccinations has not exceeded 900,000 a day. By contrast India was doing 20 million a day. By September 2021 the US had fallen behind all nations in the G-7 in percentage of people vaccinated with one or two doses, behind Italy, France, UK, Germany, Japan, Canada. Trust was also needed, not just vaccine supplies to make a vaccination drive effective. By September the US passed the 675,000 deaths that happened in 1918 pandemic. The deficiency in trust leads one expert to call it breakthrough without followthrough. Other experts see the entrenched social forces that had diminished American health and life expectancy since the 1970's also affecting the vaccination drive. ...

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Of NYT's decades old indifference, an almost Churchill like distance and indifference to the aspirations of the people of South Asia it can be said- indifference to the aspirations of 1.4 billion people to modernize the country with the same infrastructure that Europe and the US, Japan, and now China take for granted. Indifference to the problems in creating a nation  with 13 languages and 1.4 billion people that has a freely elected parliament never before done in history, one which also delivers on banking accounts, health care, infrastructure, for all its  people, of all races and religions. This indifference runs counter to everything that Indians admire about America. And a lack of awareness of what Indians admire today about the Biden administration's promise to make the words of Jefferson true in America as the Modi administration does in India- "We hold these truths to be self-evident that all men are created equal, (created equal) and that they are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights, among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness." The NYT's indifference to this inequality both in the US and in India run counter to the founding principles of Jefferson and of India's saint from Wardha, Mohandas Gandhi, who both fought the British empire at the height of its prominence.  ...

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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.   ...

LyrArc Article Gist
Britain's National Health Service has setup a medical review of gender treatment of young people. It's conclusion after 4 years of research- "The reality is that we have no good evidence on the long-term outcomes of interventions to manage gender-related distress.” This NHS review found no clear proof that  gender dysphoria in children or teenagers was resolved or alleviated by what is called gender-affirming care, where a child's declared “gender identity” is affirmed and supported with social transition, puberty blockers and/or cross-sex hormones. After Cass the British government issued an emergency ban on puberty blockers for children under age 18. A similar approach is being taken in the Scandinavian countries, and in Netherlands, France, Germany, Belgium, Switzerland, the move is away from medical treatment of gender issues. American medicine, Cass says is “out of date,” and has put politics ahead of science.Not one American medical association or governmental official has reached out to discuss Britian's Cass report. Says Cass- “I think that’s where you’re misleading the public. You need to be honest about the strength of the evidence and say what you’re going to do to improve it.”   ...