LyrArc Article Gist
Problems in graduate education, too many people taking on lstudent loans that are burdensome, over $100,000, to do research under faculty who are working on more and micrto detail fields that have less and less relevance, so that few jobs exist when they graduate. And faculty jobs are available in small numbers as tenured professors have to retire before their are new openings. Which is why in the situation where faculty work in small cloistered fields doing thier own thing, even important subjects as the role of religion in international relations happen to have been left out. It all suggests that we have asystem of graudate education out of synch with whats required.

LyrArc Article Gist
Security for women working in software companies in India is an important issue considering that the number of women in software companies will approach 50% according to Nasscom by 2010, and the poorly paid and sketchy background of many hired drivers in India. Because the women work at odd hours of the night to keep in touch with westen countries clients in different time zones this is a very real issue. The cases of a Wipro and a HP employee in India being raped and killed and drivers charged bring to light an important issue for women employees at software companies and companies in general in India. It is important to attract talented employees for companies to have the best arrangements for safe transportation at additional cost. Parents of these young women and the women should feel that its just as safe as for men for them to work or travel at night. In this case the Supreme Court decision was to let stand a lower court ruling that Mittal CEO of HP Global Soft was liable for prosecution in the case of a rape and killing by a driver of a HP employee, because the company had hired the driver and made the transportation arrangements that led to this death....

LyrArc Article Gist
Balancing medical work and family for young doctors. How a new generation of young doctors looks at the balancing of work and family and time for relaxation, the gym and so on. A whole new way of taking care of patients is taking shape that may promote better health of doctors themselves, better balancing the demands and stress in their lives from family members and their own personal needs for relaxation and exercize.

LyrArc Article Gist
On the economics of hybrid cars as fuel prices change first up steeply now down to where they were with the economic downturn, making planning difficult. Automakers are moving to increase fuel efficiency.

LyrArc Article Gist
A trip to Tugela Falls in the Drakensburg mountains from Johannesburg, South Africa. It ranks with Angel Falls, Venezuela, as the two highest waterfalls in the world.

LyrArc Article Gist
Arizona remains a state where the Republican and Democratic parties are very close. As Senator Krysten Sinema a Democrat, supported the Republican filibuster that required 60 votes for major legislation and thwarted some of president Biden's legislation to help workers and families in the US. Having alienated some Democrats she is now running for the Senate as an Independent. Her likely opponent from the Republican party is Kari Lake. Arizona is split three ways evenly for Republicans, Independents and Democrats. The question for Sinema says a Republican strategist is whether there are enough independents and soft Republicans who will vote for Sinema. Rep. Ruben Gallego is running for Democrats, Kari Lake for Republicans. Another question is whether Kari Lake's association with Mr. Trump could hurt Republicans in Arizona. Synema faces a difficult three way race as Democrats see her flagging support on key initiatives of the president as a serious problem.

LyrArc Article Gist
With a general election approaching in Britain the question about a progressive alliance is brought up in the Guardian. A big block is the Labour party with its obsession for vote share, and not seeking alliances of any kind. The Liberal Democrats are creating their own barriers with hostility towards Labour party. This report cites Best for Britain data and says 457 seats are immune to alliances. Of 150 marginals 111 seats the numbers show if SNP, Lib Democrats, Greens swung behind Labour party  it would make a big difference. as in 30 seats even a 5% swing from Labour to the Lib Democrats would give the seat to the Conservatives. The other approach is to have informal alliances at the grassroots level so that progressive candidates can do well.

 

LyrArc Article Gist
Efforts to make it possible for Princess Akiko, 19 years old, the only child of Emperor Naruhito 60 years, to succeed her father. Japan has never had a female as Queen, in the manner of Queen Elizabeth in England.

LyrArc Article Gist
This WSJ editorial says GE's decision to exit the banking business follows the U.S. Federal Reserve's move to designate GE Capital a "systemically important financial institution," subject to extra scrutiny by the Fed and stricter regulation. This reduces the potential for higher returns that existed in the earlier environment of limited regulation. It points out that GE was so keen on escaping the "too big to fail" label and stricter regulatory oversight that it was willing to pay $6 billion in taxes to repatriate cash from overseas as part of shrinking GE Capital. In an earlier editorial in 2011 WSJ pointed to the role of GE Capital in the financial crisis of 2008, when GE shares dropped to $6 and GE needed government rescue funds.

LyrArc Article Gist
Self reflection by the boomers, born between 1946 and 1964 numbering some 78 million people, who gave commencement speeches this year from Ken Burns, documentary maker, at Boston College, to Democratic Senator Bennet of Colorado at Colorado College, on the mistakes of this generation. Senator Bennet used three figures to make his point about the failure, from 2000 the annual median family income declined in the US by $300, health care costs went up by 80%, and the cost of higher education went up by 60%. By contrast to this the so-called Millenials, born between 1982 and 2001, just want to see what works and get on with it, says Stefanie Sanford, an education expert. One graduate from the University of Kentucky, Julie Meador, a marketing major, is earning $7.50 an hour as part-time sales associate at Gap. Her view is that what she most thinks of is finding a good job, and not thinking of saving the world just yet.

LyrArc Article Gist
Christoph Hasselbach of DW.com says the idea of European Union brings so much good for Europe that it should not be diminished by use of pressure or punishment. He refers to the firm opinion in Brussels, of Mr. Juncker and Merkel, that there can be no cherry picking when it comes to remaining in the EU. This led in Jan. 2017 to British prime minister May saying Britain would not go begging to Brussels, and would simply opt out of the European Union and the single market. Hasselbach offers an interesting and plausible explanation for the Brexit vote shifting by a small margin to the exit side. He says rightly that uncontrolled immigration fears were used by the politicians supporting exit. Interestingly he says the worries in the UK were not just for current people but for future citizens from the hundreds of thousands of refugees who would become German citizens in a few years. Would they try to settle in the UK- prime minister Cameron failed to provide a convincing answer, says Hasselbach. He is right to point out as we have at Lyrarc that it is healthy to have questions and even some skeptical views about Brussels, that the appeal of the EU must depend on not being dogmatic about it, but being open and willing to accept questions.   ...

LyrArc Article Gist
Toutiao and the growing mobile segment for news aggregated from thousands of sources for tech, politics, and other local news. Toutiao and Tencent QQ are taking advantage of the growing need for news in China. Toutiao's algorithm targets new internet users in rural areas and small towns who are looking for news and do not need the use of global news sites as is done by Google and Apple. The deep learning of computers is used to study user habits such as learning about the main soccer teams, watching funny videos,as habits of users. Beijing Bytedance Technology has come up with the new site. The highest growth rate is now for news on mobile, growth is 73% year over year far surpassing travel and mobile video, according to QuestMobile.

China restricts use of Google and Facebook News and other sites and favors local content and news sites to give international news, and news about China.