Global factory activity continued to improve in May amid growing optimism that the worst of the recession may be over. Output contracted at a much less ferociously than at the start of the year in one economy after another, and this month three countries actually registered output growth - India, China and Turkey. The JP Morgan global manufacturing index (PMI) rose to 45.3 in May from 41.8 in April, the highest level in nine months, although still a long way below the 50.0 mark dividing growth from contraction. The component indexes for output and new orders were both running at much higher levels than in April. However, the headline PMI is still at a very low level by historic standards, and well below one which ...

Just when I thought I was all done posting video interviews from my last trip to Washington, I saw Bob's post today about the Gary Hart and Dmitri Simes article about realism, interests, and the prospects for cooperation between the Obama Administration and Russia.  In response, I have gathered together some of the last scraps of the interview I shot with David Satter from the cutting room floor, as his comments strangely seem to engage almost in a direct dialogue with the Hart and Simes piece, especially in terms of debating realism (though the interview occured a month before this article was published).  Some of my questions to Satter stemmed from an article he published in Forbes in November 2008 containing advice for Obama on Russia, including the point to "ignore the realists."  Taken together, the video ...