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World War II with Tom Hanks review- good for new generation of young people who have not seen Saving Private Ryan or documentaries made in ,the 70's. There are too many talking heads and not like in the 70's when survivors could give live accounts of what they saw, as they are dead by now. There is good new video footage.  Yet the war is of epic proportions on so many fronts, 20 episodes barely touch the major events of WWII, not to mention the events in Asia and Japan, the events in North Africa and Italy. Each of these areas has separate books in the work of Rick Atkinson who worked on it for a decade. Atkinson is interviewed by Rubinstein on C-SPAN showing that there is new interest in what happened in World War II. For the Asian side of the story the story does not start in 1939, the Japanese invasion and occupation of China is shown from the days after 1914 through the story of Gen. Joe Stilwell who is the American who for half a century to 1945 was America's main representative in China, and Franklin Roosevelt's and America's commanding general in China in the fight against the Imperial Japanese Army. The empathy of Stilwell for the Chinese people and his willingness to risk his life to help is simply amazing- and is something to take away from this book by Barbara Tuchman. There is a lot that America can be proud of in creating a rising tide in Asia that has lifted all boats. ...

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After three years o rock star popularity prime minister Trudeau's popularity has dropped so far that his party could lose the October general elections. This is after Canada's Attorney General resisted efforts by Trudeau and senior officials to let a Canadian company SNC-Lavalin avoid trial. Since then recording of a iphone call taken by the Attorney General with a top government official Mr. Wernick has created an uproar on this matter. Ms. Wilson-Raybould, the Attorney General saying in that conversation that this was going to look like nothing but political interference by the prime minister and everybody else involved in this. Nearly two thirds of Canadians now disapprove of the job Trudeau is doing according to a poll by Ipsos Public Affairs and Agnus Reid Institute.  Rock star popularity can fade quickly. In Brazil Ignacio Da Silva was popular till a crisis with state finances and the Car Wash scandal involving illegal payments led to the loss of his Workers Party in the recent elections. Mr. Trudeau had won support by supporting clean governance and giving women a say in governing. Ms. Raybould was transferred to a lower position after her unwillingness to follow government officials on the CNC Lavalin issue. Now the Liberals Party of Trudeau is trailing the rival Conservatives and Ms. Raybauld is a highly respected figure in Canada. ...

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Nearly 9-10 million Indians work in the Persian Gulf kingdoms. They are affected by the war with Iran. About 1 million have returned to India during the current war in 2026. About 2.2 million of the 9 million are from Kerala state in southern Indian coastline with cities such as Kochi and Thiruvananthapuram the capital. Of the $50 billion they send back as remittances to India Kerala gets the largest amount among the states in India. As aresult this is affecting the state economy. Many people in the Gulf are being laid off as the Gulf economies are hit by the war. Recovery will be strong in 2027 only in Saudi and UAE (Emirates), others Kuwait, Qatar, Bahrain, Oman will take much longer to recover according to some forecasts.

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PM Modi will meditate for 3 days and nights at the Vivekananda rock in the Indian Ocean on May 30 to June 1, 2024. In 1892 Swami Vivekananda meditated on a rock in the ocean at the tip of India in Kanya Kumari, as he set India on a path to modernization for the next 100 years and beyond. Many Indians including prime minister Modi have Vivekananda's mission for India's modernization as their clear objective, and this is behind the everything the PM does including the vision of Vikshit Bharat, a developed country by 2047 on the 100th anniversary of independence. Gandhiji read all of Vivekananda's writings and his freedom struggle against British rule was based on Vivekananda's ideas for India's regeneration and renewal leading to his book Hind Swaraj in 1905. The Bhagavad Gita was translated by Swami Swarupananda, a disciple of Vivekananda, and formed the basis for Gandhiji in the freedom struggle against the British.  Europe faced colonization on the Iberian peninsula and invasions right up to Budapest and Vienna by the 14th century, India faced the same and this was followed for India and China by the expansion of the British into Asia when China and India failed to grasp early the importance of science and technology and the new ideas that happened in Europe by the 18th and 19th century. Vivekananda wanted to see science and technology and the advances of modernization brought to the people of India a process happening as India modernizes all aspects of its economy. Vivekananda was also the inspiration for Indonesia's freedom struggle by Sukarno against Dutch rule. India and Indonesia today make up the largest population in the world larger than China and Japan combined, with a common culture and heritage and are together modernizing every aspect of the life of people.  ...

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Rick Perry's IPO for startup Fermi plans to build natural gas processing plants in Amarillo, Texas, in wide open country, and wait for approval of large nuclear plants planned for the next couple of years. It is attempting to build on the surge in data power for AI. Yet these investments in data power take away from other needs for power in the manufacturing sector and for homes and infrastructure. How the Nation allocates scarce resources is something on which there will be much debate.

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Rick Perry, former governor of Texas, at one time suggested elimination of the Energy Department. He is likely to be confirmed by the U.S. Congress to head the Energy Department in the Trump administration.

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A rock sample of the moon is brought back by China's Chiang 6 Mission lunar exploration program on June 25, 2024.

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Criticism in the media for Justin Trudeau's carefully cultivated image and reuse of the family brand. After three years in office it slowly comes apart with revelations of poor judgement and promotion of rock star kind of image, without substance behind it. Promotion of gender equality, indigenous people, and other ideas did not have the conviction behind it that is needed, and the lack of forthrightness becomes evident. In the last two years the images of popular presidents in the media have come apart in countries from Brazil to Canada, with skepticism even in the U.S. and Britain for former presidents and prime ministers who carefully cultivated their image or simply popular in the media.

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Officials in the U.S. Rocky mountain states of Montana, Wyoming, Colorado, Utah, Idaho and New Mexico say the resistance to face masks and social distancing are reasons for rapid spread of coronavirus in these states in the second wave. People tired of the pandemic have failed to follow the basic rules. In parts of Idaho sports games had to be halted because of militant maskless fans.

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Turkey faces a economic crisis driven by high inflation and sharp decline of over 40% in the lira. The ENAgrup research group estimates inflation at 58% in November over the prior year, higher than the 22% official figures. ENAGrup estimates 50% inflation in October and 45% inflation in September. The steep inflation say experts is a result of an unconventional policy of president Erdogan to lower interest rates by 2%. In contrast the Russian central bank increased interest rates by about 3%, Brazil's central bank by about 6%. This report looks at two weak links for the lira and inflation prospects with graphs.  One is that the debt of Turkish banks is heavily in foreign currency debt with $82 billion due in next 12 months. A weak lira makes it harder to pay off these debts. Turkey's central bank net foreign assets taking into account all foreign currency liabilities is a negative $48 billion in Oct 2021, according to graphs shown in WSJ. The second is that Turkey's people are fleeing the lira. Nearly 60% of banking deposits are now in foreign currencies, according to data from Capital Economics. A sudden surge in requests to withdraw dollars by Turkish residents could make banks to draw down their foreign currency reserves. The government hopes that increase in exports could help Turkey in the crisis yet the situation today as shown by WSJ suggests a continuation of the current crisis of spiraling inflation and large drops in the lira's value. ...

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John Harwood's interview with Govenor Rick Perry. Harwood asks Perry tough questions about his 20% flat tax, spending cuts and the deficit (response: the only way to get the country working again is to reduce the tax burden across the board and create the incentives to invest), raising the retirement age for Social Security (response: will discuss this one with Congress), views on regulation (response: regulators did not do their job, nothing wrong with the old regulatory system). Perry saying that this is the way America has always worked- by creating the incentives to invest. Perry say he is for a bold plan not something that will trim things at the edges as Romney would do.

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Is the UK government committed to keeping the triple lock on pensions that help pensioners, retirees, keep up with the cost of living. Liz Truss the UK prime minister waffles on this issue by first saying yes, then no, then yes. The US just announced social security payments to retirees will increase by 8.6% in 2023. The triple lock is a way of saying that pensions will be increased each year by the maximum of inflation or average earnings, and more than 2.5%. With inflation at over 10% UK pensions would be increased similar to the US, slightly higher by 10%. This is critical to meet needs of older Britons or Americans, and similar policies are being followed in France, Germany and other EU countries. Housing costs are rising very rapidly. This leaves less for food and heating. This means some older Britons or Americans are missing meals. In Britain a TUC report shows one of seven Britons missing meals because of income not keeping up with the cost of living crisis, which is now number one on people's minds.  ...

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It was Doctors, the Bankers, Consultants, now it is Law Firms imposing outrageous costs on the economy. Law firms indirectly adding to the cost of doing business with outrageous per hour rates ($2500 per hour?), costs sure to be transferred to consumers and buyers in today's Cost of Living crisis. Another instance of price gouging in a different context that pushes up costs and prices, something Harris talked about in the debate.

There is a 30% jump in lawyer fees from $190,000 to $250,000, for junior associates since 2018. It is just not sustainable. Part of the problem is  hourly rates and companies such as Shell are looking for alternative arrangements- ones that make the final costs predictable and transparent.

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Gerald Seib of the WSJ describes the huge wave of young supporters who helped Labor party leader Corbyn in Britain's 2017 general election. He cites an analysis by the Financial Times that shows young people backed Labor over the Conservatives by 51 points more than the national average. People over age 65 backed Conservatives by 32 points more than the national average. This points to a staggering age gap of 83 points, said the Financial Times. Young people failed to turn out in large numbers during the Brexit vote, and this was a large factor in the pro Brexit win. One exit poll shows turnout went up by 12% in 2017 compared to the 2015 parliamentary election. Only 26% of voters in a WSJ/NBC poll for ages 18-34 years say they approve of U.S. president Trump's performance, 64% disapprove. Seib says the movement of Corbyn is similar to the Bernie Sanders movement in the U.S. and has implications for a similar surge of support showing up in the U.S.

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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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Rick Perry gets the endorsement of South Carolina's David Wilkins, former state House speaker. Perry completed an 8 day campaign trip through South Carolina. He made his announcement in Charleston, S.C.

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The Boeing Starliner docks with the International Space Station on June 6, 2024. It carries 2 NASA astronauts Butch Wilmore and Suni WIllliams who will spend a week at the Space Station.