China is no longer a low-wage economy. To avoid being caught in a trap where its products are neither really cheap, nor really good, it wants to go upmarket, moving from low-tech standard products to high-tech, high-value products. This is what the strategy “China 2025” is about, supported by big government funding. Is this a legitimate strategy, or is it unfair competition? The US thinks the latter and is determined to do what it can to stop it. But they are unlikely to succeed.

The spectacular arrest in Canada of the chief financial officer from Chinese telecom giant Huawei follows on the heels of the US punishing another Chinese telecom company, ZTE, earlier this year. The argument is that these companies have violated the US sanctions against Iran. But this is a much deeper conflict and of existential importance for both the US and China and the consequences are far-reaching. How far is the US willing to go to prevent China from becoming a technological great power?

Foreign Affairs named in 2011 Russia “The dying bear”, pointing to the country’s high mortality and the low fertility. “Russia's economy doesn't produce anything that anybody wants to buy, except oil, gas and arms”, said ex-president Obama at his final news conference in 2016. “Vladimir Putin is a bigger threat than Isis”, according to Senator and ex-presidential candidate John McCain. And according to the actor Morgan Freeman, the US is now at war with Russia. But then everything should be fine. Russia is on its way down the drain. No people left, a useless economy, finished. Or are they once again underestimating their declared enemy?

“The Russian economy is in tatters”, said ex-president Barak Obama in his State of the Union Address in January 2015, and one year earlier he had described Russia as a “regional power”. The republican ex-presidential candidate senator John McCain said in March 2014 that Russia is “a gas station masquerading as a country”. “Lights our out for the Putin Regime”, “Is Putin’s Russia Headed for a Systemic Collapse?”, “Is Vladimir Putin’s big collapse coming soon?”, “The Achilles Heel of Putin’s Regime” - the list of dire predictions for Russia and the “Putin regime” from the last year or so is endless. But are they correct?

The cost of solar energy has plunged in recent years, and solar panels are now dirt cheap. We have just installed a 46 kW solar roof top system here in Leon, Nicaragua, which produces energy at 7.5 cents of a US dollar – that is around a third of what the electricity company charges us. So there is no excuse for continuing contributing to global warming. The energy revolution is here, right now.

We are in 2017 an estimated 7,500 million people on the planet earth – three times the 2,500 million we were in 1950. According to projections made by UN, we will be 9,700 million in 2050 and 11,200 million at the end of the century. The growing world population and its natural desire for decent living conditions imply an enormous stress on our planet with global warming, depletion of resources, decreasing biodiversity, polluted and congested megacities and accumulation of waste. Can we handle this in the future?

Should people have the right to move freely between countries? As it is well known, in large parts of the world, capital is already moving freely. And well-off people can move freely: in many developed countries, if you promise to invest enough, you get a permanent residence permit. But why limit this to well-off people? Why not let all people move as they want? It is a good question. But apart from the well-known problems in the country receiving the migrants, it is often overlooked that massive migrations carry high costs for the migrants. And the countries they leave behind tend to get stuck in a low level of development.

The EU is obviously in trouble as confidence in the Union is dropping in many member countries. Of course there are many explanations, some of these related to the life of the politicians in Brussels, disconnected from the people of their home countries. But unfortunately, the problems go much deeper. EU has simply not been up to the job it was supposed to do and has concentrated on the wrong issues. The drive to enlarge the EU with Turkey and Ukraine may be the last straw to break the camel’s back.

“Save Aleppo” has been the appeal for the last couple of years. It is a bit misleading, as there has for years been two Aleppos: East Aleppo under rebel control and West Aleppo under Syrian Government Control. The civil war between the two parts has imposed immense suffering on both East and West Aleppo, but most on the East, as the Syrian Army has superior fire power and dominates the sky. Urban warfare, when the civil population has not been evacuated, is cruel and barbarian, as the civil casualties are horrifying. And now that the battle of Aleppo is over, the recriminations begin: we should have done something to save Aleppo, and we didn’t.

But the question is: what should we have done?

Fogh Rasmussen, the Danish ex-PM that took a reluctant Denmark into the illegal invasion of Iraq in 2003, has not only avoided the dock, where many think he belongs. Unlike what happened in England, he has also avoided any public enquiry into the decision to participate in the invasion and possible war crimes committed. On the contrary, he was promoted to General Secretary of NATO and is now a well-paid speaker at international events. He doesn't have to look nervously over his shoulder to see if somebody is after him. No problem, this is Denmark.