Hello and welcome to Background Briefing, available 24-7 at Background Briefing.org. I'm me and Masters,

and today we'll examine a number of stories and issues in the news.

We'll begin with insight into the attitudes of corporate leaders and billionaires

expressed in softball interviews at Davos towards the possibility of Trump being re-elected,

with Jamie Diamond saying Trump is, quote, kind of right about NATO, immigration, the economy and China,

while opining that, quote, negative talk about MAGA is going to hurt Biden's electoral chances.

Joining us to discuss how American industry and banking leaders at Davos are quite okay with

Trump winning the presidency is Michael Hiltzig, a Pulitzer Prize winning reporter and columnist at the Los Angeles Times.

He received the Pulitzer Prize for articles exposing corruption in the entertainment industry.

Currently, he writes a twice-weekly column covering business and economic issues relevant to life in California.

His books include The New Deal and

Modern History and Iron Empires, Rubber Barron's Railroads and the Making of Modern America.

We'll discuss his latest article at the Los Angeles Times, Davos, where the rich and powerful

go to show off their ignorance. Then we'll focus on the Balochistan region of Pakistan and its border with Iran,

which has seen missile and drone strikes first by Iran into Pakistan,

then retaliation from Pakistan with strikes into Iran.

Joining us is Dr. Daniel Markey, a senior advisor on South Asia at the United

States Institute of Peace and a senior fellow at the Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced

International Studies Foreign Policy Institute. From 2003 to 2007, Dr. Markey was a member of the

United States State Department's policy planning staff,

where his work focused on U.S. strategy in South Asia, especially Pakistan and India.

His books include China's Western Horizon, Beijing and the New Geopolitics of Asia,

...