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What Movies or TV shows are you watching (2025)
I'm a fan of the Australian legal office comedy series Fisk. I had watched the first two seasons and recently realized the third was already out, so happily binged on that. A fourth season has not been announced as yet. The finale of Season 3 could work either as a finale or an opener to a Season 4. -
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Why manufacturing won't return to the U.S. - former CEO Motorola
Looks like everyone attacked the messenger. Probably didn't bother reading the article. The article was an interview with Dennis Woodside, former CEO of Motorola Mobility, until parent Google sold it to Lenovo. The article realates to market research commiss ioned by the company that suggested Motorola could grab significant share in the US against Apple and Samsung, with a "Made in USA". Within a year, they had to shut down their Texas factory, producing the then flagship Moto X phone, and shift production overseas. Woodside claims the issue Motorola faced in Texas was a combination of a skills shortage in the area, plus an inability to retain employees, diluting the experience within the company. The Fort Worth factory was intended to be an assembly line, taking subcomponants sourced overseas, but offering customisation of product more suited to a US customer base than the imported Apple and Samsung one size fits all model. Poor sales and a long supply chain meant the phone was not profitable. Sales were one fifth to one tenth of where they needed to be for break even. Customers, it turned out, did not value "Made in USA" that highly, put that above technical features, price performance etc. Notably, Woodside noted that Motorola faced competition for employees in the service industries; food and retail. He also noted that the device being assembled had a large number of very small components, that US workers found difficult to deal with. The article cites conservative think tank, the Cato Institute (I remember it being conservative because PJ O'Rourke was with them) https://www.cato.org/sites/cato.org/files/2024-08/Globalization Survey_2024.pdf The summer 2024 survey quoted: Which seems to support the suppostion that its generally very challenging in the US to recruit people into an industry that largely demands hand assembly (the intricate parts in a phone). US Labor Dept stats in 2023 suggested 12.5-12.7million workers in US manufacturing. The article contrasts manufacturing labour shortages in the US with a surplus of manufacturing labour in China. The CSIS is quoted, a think tank described as bipartisan, but rates by some sources as "lean left", pointing out that vocational training strategy in the US is something left to the State level, whereas China makes vocational training a national priority, and this enables the development of a workforce at scale (my observation is that in the US, states are set up to compete against each other, rather than competing against the world, a hangover from a past industrial age that is no longer true). Some respondants challenge this article, by cherry picked examples, adopting a Corbynista approach (he had a magic money tree, they have a magic skills tree). They are deliberately spreading a false agenda to support false news. Every year, since the US was founded, companies have created factories, companies have shuttered factories. Layoffs are as part of the industrial landscape as recruitment. Lets go through the cited examples. Abbott; Abbott Labs, a company that profited from the COVID pandemic in selling knowingly inaccurate COVID tests, will create 300 jobs in manufacturing and R&D at two plants, as part of a $500m investment. There will be 100 new jobs in Texas and 200 in Illinois. This is part of an expansion of their US transfusion business. Between 2020 and 2025, the company (according to their transcript and filings) an average of $1 billion each year into US manufacturing and $2 billion in R&D (mostly M&A and cashing in on COVID), so once you get away from the headline, it looks like they have cut investment in the US massively. The good news is they are creating some new jobs, but I doubt any of this is to do with tariffs, and its more to do with the commoditization of their previous big money earner, the CGMs that people are sticking on their arms; these are mostly made overseas. Commodization of diabetes products means products now are competing purely on price. Globally, Abbott employs 149,000 people. Each year, the company on average creates about 1700 new jobs. Apple; Apple had previously said they were investing $500m over the next 4 years. This was announced months before the tariffs, but to be fair, they were likely anticipating these. Apple are several times over much bigger than Abbott. The last time Apple announced one of these US investment deals was in early 2021, then it was $430 billion over the next 4-5 years. On the face of it, adjusting for inflation, investment is flat. the take away is that while tariffs are not necessarily encouraging Apple to invest more in US manufacturing, they don't seem, yet, enough to dissuade such investment. The Corning deal is a continuation of a deal first announced in early 2024. Its pretty normal. It would have happened, tariffs or no tariffs, as Apple builds a long term strategic relationship with Corning. Chobani; scraping the barrel here. Greek yoghurt manufacture, $1.2 billion for 1000 jobs. Seems making the money for making milk products goes further, in jobs creation, than advanced medical devices and cutting edge AI servers. Or course, the US isn't really importing much yoghurt from anywhere. Its a $12 billion market in the US. About $100m in yoghurt virtually all from France and Canada is imported, so a miniscule part of the market. Not a tariff success story, once you take the leftist CBS report apart. Cra-Z-Art; This is a regional chain of arts and crafts store, turnover about $25m a year. This increase in its US manufacturing capacity by 50% is part of a programme of investment that started in 2021, during the Biden years as it happened, but I'm sure nothing to do with that President. The CEO is claiming the latest move is tariffs drivem expanding sq footage of manufacturing from 1 million to 1.5 million sq feet. The company is the largest manufacturer of pencils, which I'm sure is a double digit growing market. While the company had increased US capacity, at the same same time, this US capacity is utterly dwarfed by its expansion of non-US manufacturing, through the acquisition of Swiss company, Joker AG, which has substantive Chinese and Hong Kong facilities. I see a company hedging its bets. Johnson & Johnson; $55bn into US manufacturing over the next 4 years, up 25% compared to the previous 4 years. Inflation adjusted, a decent increase in investment. But lets not forget they have offered $6.5 bn in compensation for their cancer causing talc, probably will need to increase that. This is part of a multu year investment programme that started in 2017, so its a policy not really driven by tariffs but by tax policy for obvious reasons. Tariffs are going to cost them $400m this year. The CEO noted that the 2017 tax policies have been a far more effective driver of investment than tariffs are. Now, China is a net importer of US medical products, the tariffs war has resulted in JnJ losing out in China, not the US. Honda. Its shifting production from Japan to Indiana. Currently their Civic Hybrid model is produced in both countries. The company wouldn't divulge why except that "the company's policy since its foundation that we produce cars where the demand is". However, company spokesmen claimed its nothing to do with tariffs. Honda saw a 59% profit decline, with Japan sales tanking. In fact, other CIvics have not been sold in Japan since 2010. Its not a very popular model there. Hyundai; Now is the time to reflect how far Hyundai has come. It started making knock offs of Jeeps from scrap metal. By the 1970s, it was bringing over British Leyland engineers in an effort to basically make the Hyundai Pony into a Morris Marina. Now Americans are begging it to give them jobs. The thrust of their investment is $21bn over the next 3 years, doubling their total US investment. A major part of that is to build a furnace in Lousiana, which the the company describes as giving them the ability to recycle the scrap metal that is abundant in the US (a bit harsh to describe Fords and Chevrolets), as part of their strategy of total domination of the US market (so creating jobs in order for someone else to lose theirs). Who would have thought; it wasn't so long ago that Hyundais were regarded as the crappest machines on the road (Hyundai Accent? Steller, which was a rebodied old Cortina). The main difference between a Ford being driven out of the market and Hyundai taking over, is that Ford profits stay in America. Hyundai profits go to Seoul. IBM. Didn't know they were still about. But is it s a big investment of $150bn, mostly in Quantum computing. Probably not huge number of jobs, and many, ironically, will be H1bs. I'd say this is driven by Project Stargate, which is where the US government said it was going to support a consortium of American-Arab banks build new infrastructure to support a massive AI project, which is essentially data harvesting on a gargantuan scale (if they actually get it to work), which will make the Chinese government's efforts to digitize and effectively monitor their citizens, look tifling. Still, its what people wanted. As part of this, the FDA is seeking Congessional authority to access all medical records. Apparently, they say, they need this data to test medical device apps for "accuracy" and are assuring you they won't use the data for anything else. I'm actually in favour of this, essentially establishing a national whole genome database, that can be used by doctors for the purposes of allowing would be parents to have informed choices, right through to determining what sort of job bests suits you, to looking at how the end for you will be, and what you can do about that. Merck; Big Pharma Merck (Jib jabs etc) is using $1bn to build a plant to make the cancer immunotherapy, Keytruda, for the US market. Keytruda blocks PD-L1, the latest miracle biomarker. For this drug, they have taken a mouse antibody, and mutated it to resemble a human antibody, then they inject this into you. To get this drug, you have to undergo testing with the Dako test, not any other test, otherwise, you can't be reimbused. A year's treatment costs $150k. The story here is that after 10 years, Keytruda's patents are about to expire, and if will face off-patent, and cheaper, alternatives. The tariffs might have, partly, driven this move, but its not good news for the patient. They'll still be paying $150k as long as Merck can get away with it. The $1bn shores up profits for the shareholders, before drug armagaddon. NVIDIA; for the first time ever, making chips and super computers in the US. This is the only significant story of the lot. But what you are seeing with AI will NOT be US or Chinese or anyone dominating the space. Because of data leaks, expect the raising of electronic borders. Keeping your data is critical. Its bad for competition, because there won't be any. Expect the rise of mega corporations that have fingers in everyone's lives. A Bladerunner type future, wuth the Tyrell Corporation running everything, including your virtual sex doll. "The engines of the world's AI infrastructure" is false; that infrastructure won't be hosting Chinese data, European data, African data.AI with American data will be fairly useless for Chinese and Japanese markets and vice versa. What will free us from this upcoming tyranny is someone who can render electronic firewalls obsolete. This will be the negative consequences of the Novecene until the machines take over. Roche; a big deal. Butone thing to note, with these Pharma deals, a lot depends on the FDA's ability to regulate. Its not just like building a new car factory. So Roche has issued a veiled threat, "the totality of our $50-billion investment is dependent on the current policy environment in the US and will be reassessed if legislation or regulations were implemented that would harm our industry's ability to operate and innovate in America". This is a heavy hint that it wants the President to make it easier for drugs and vaccines to be approved. This is in stark difference with a general feeling that, for instance, COVID-19 vaccines have undergone insufficient testing, before, according to some, being forced on the US population, perhaps causing uncessary injury and death. From a jobs point of view, Roche already has 25,000 US employees and 13 US manufacturing sites. The $50bn is a big number, but is expected to add 400 jobs to the US. TSMC; Asian . Like NVIDIA, TSMC is doing a superb job of cupping the balls of the US, and stroking its shaft.. TSMC is said to be doing this, because by saying it will build some kind of US presence, it will get complete exemption on all imported chips. Like Roche, though, this company is warning the US government; any more changes in policy, and it will pull its Arizona investment "New import restrictions could jeopardize current U.S. leadership in the competitive technology industry and create uncertainties for many committed semiconductor capital projects in the U.S., including TSMC Arizona's significant investment plan in Phoenix" From WARNTracker -
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THAILAND LIVE Thailand Live Monday 11 August 2025
Indian Man Arrested for Fake 90,000 Baht Payment in Pattaya Pictures courtesy of Matichon. Police have arrested a 29-year-old Indian national for attempting to pay for food and drinks with a forged bank transfer slip at a well-known pub on Walking Street. Full story:https://aseannow.com/topic/1369348-indian-man-arrested-for-fake-90000-baht-payment-in-pattaya/ -
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THAILAND LIVE Thailand Live Monday 11 August 2025
Charred Body Found Chained to Post After Blaze Destroys Home Pictures courtesy of Daily News. A man in his sixties was found dead, chained to a post, after a fire tore through a house in Sai Yok district, Kanchanaburi province, on 9 August. Full story:https://aseannow.com/topic/1369325-charred-body-found-chained-to-post-after-blaze-destroys-home/ -
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Is Wororot Market back to normal?
Still inexpensive,with nice womens cotton dresses, fresh produce, pharmacies? Thanks.
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