Perhaps the most important topic of the day was the useful meeting  President Joe Biden had today with Chinese President Xi Jinping .  The ultimate danger of the Russia-Ukraine War is escalation to nuclear warfare, and just China and the U.S. agreeing to restore military-to-military communications was a key step in preventing another war to end all wars. Well, maybe new House Speaker Mike Johnson is the right man for job, for he was able to  avert a government shutdown .   Legislation passed 336 to 95, with opposition by 93 Republicans and 2 Democrats.  Sounds like a bipartisan solution to me. The bill, which now goes to the Senate, which will pass it on to the President who will sign it: Extends funding until January 19 for certain appropriations, and the rest of government until February 2.  This will give lawmakers more to to rant and rave. No poison pills. The House right flank is pissed, but has not made any calls for ouster . How smart is all this?  Well,  Business Insider  said

Before getting into nostalgia, who is  new UK Prime Minister Rishi Sunak ? 42-year old Hindu born in Southampton whose parents of Indian descent migrated from East Africa in the 1960s. Went to Oxford, then got an MBA from Stanford University as a Fulbright Scholar. While at Stanford, met his wife Akshata Murthy, daughter of Indian billionaire N.R. Narayana Murthy, who founded Infosys. Rishi and Akshata have two children and are an almost billionaire couple, the 222nd richest people in Britain. First British Asian and Hindu to become prime minister. While relatively young, David Cameron in 2010 was only a year older at 43, while the first PM, Robert Walpole in 1721 was 44, William Cavendish in 1756 was 36, Charles Watson-Wentworth was 35, Augustus FitzRoy in 1768 was 33 and William Pitt the Younger ( right ) in 1783 was 24.  Winston Churchill in 1940 was 65, Margaret Thatcher in 1979 was 53 and Tony Blair in 1997 was 43. According to  Time  magazine: He bears none of the clownish antics