| | | | A New Trump Trade War…With Canada??? | | The lesson from President Trump's "rant" about trade with Canada? That he wants to have his cake and eat it, suggests Thomas Walkom in the Toronto Star.
Trump "wants Canada to dismantle any trade barriers, such as supply management, that inconvenience the U.S. Simultaneously, he wants the U.S. to retain the right to erect trade barriers of its own," Walkom writes.
"Trudeau may appeal to reason. He has pointed out, correctly, that all nations -- including the U.S. -- subsidize farmers. He was too polite to point out that Canada's supply management system, which puts the entire burden on consumers, is more efficient than America's jumbled system of farm subsidies, which puts the burden on taxpayers.
"But Trump isn't in this game to be reasonable or to learn. He is in it to win."
| | Japan Getting Edgy Over Kim's Missiles: Report | | A Japanese government website offering "information on how the public will be notified of an impending [North Korean] missile attack and what actions they should take," has seen a surge in interest this month, the Japan Times reports, with the number of visitors to the site jumping from 450,000 in March to around 2.6 million this month.
"But with Tokyo admitting there will likely be only about 10 minutes between the time a warning is issued and impact, those in or near the targeted area will have little time to flee to safety," the paper says. "…If you are outside when a warning is sounded or received, the government's advice is to proceed calmly to the strongest concrete building you can quickly get to, or to go underground, if possible." - Per the Wall Street Journal: "U.N. diplomats involved in monitoring sanctions on North Korea say enforcement among member states is one of the biggest problems in ensuring their effectiveness."
- Fareed on why it might be worth trying something new with North Korea: "We tend to view North Korea as an utterly weird country run by a loony dictator with bad hair. And there is evidence to support all these characterizations. But it is also a regime that wants to survive, and has.
"I recall many similar arguments made about Iran before the nuclear deal that it was a fanatical country, run by mad mullahs. We were told they could never be negotiated with, would never accept a deal, would never disconnect their centrifuges, and would violate any agreement within weeks.
"So far, all these predictions have proved wrong. It might be worth trying a new policy with North Korea."
Watch Fareed's full Take on Trump's North Korea policy.
| | | Russian President Vladimir Putin might talk a proud game, but he's also starting to sound just a little desperate, writes Tobin Harshaw in Bloomberg View. "That's because, after years of phenomenal growth, the exports of Russian-made arms have stagnated. And it couldn't have come at a worse time, with oil prices devastating the economy in the midst of a massive military buildup dependent in large part on those foreign sales." "…[A]s former clients like China and India get wealthier, Russia is being forced to go upscale. And in developing next-generation jets and missile-defense systems, Moscow is losing its competitive advantage. Given American companies' superior reputations and track records, it makes less and less sense for aspiring powers to buy Russian." | | No, Singapore Isn't a Free Market Health Utopia | | Conservatives casting around for a health care model for the United States appear to have settled on Singapore as an example of "a free market health care paradise," writes Ezra Klein for Vox.
But while Singapore suggests "unusual fusions of conservative and liberal ideas in health care" are possible, the city state is by no means a free market utopia, Klein says.
"Quite the opposite, really. It's a largely state-run health care system where the government designed the insurance products with a healthy appreciation for free market principles -- the kind of policy Milton Friedman might have crafted if he'd been a socialist.
"Unlike in America, where the government's main role is in managing insurance programs, Singapore's government controls and pays for much of the medical system itself -- hospitals are overwhelmingly public, a large portion of doctors work directly for the state, patients can only use their Medisave accounts to purchase preapproved drugs, and the government subsidizes many medical bills directly."
| | Slow Growth Is the New Normal. Get Used to It: Sharma | | | The slowdown in global economic growth isn't a passing trend – it's the new normal, suggests Ruchir Sharma in Foreign Affairs. Unfortunately, governments around the world are ignoring reality. And it could have troubling consequences. "Between the end of World War II and the financial crisis of 2008, the global economy was supercharged by explosive population growth, a debt boom that fueled investment and boosted productivity, and an astonishing increase in cross-border flows of goods, money, and people," Sharma writes. "Today, all three trends have begun to sharply decelerate…" "In an ideal world, political leaders would recognize this new reality and dial back their ambitions accordingly. Instead, many governments are still trying to push their economies to reach unrealistic growth targets…This growing disconnect between the political mood and the economic reality could prove dangerous." | | America, Take Your Head Out of the Sand: White | | | America and its allies are mistaken if they think that simply staying away from a major Chinese summit next month will somehow slow China's challenge to the U.S.-led liberal order, writes Hugh White for the Straits Times. With a potential price tag of around a trillion dollars, the One Belt, One Road initiative would far overshadow America's post-World War II Marshall Plan, White says. And while "making it a reality will require an extraordinary alignment of financial resources, technical skills, political commitment and international cooperation…it has the power and prestige of President Xi Jinping behind it. It is at the center of his vision for China, and of his ambition to transform China's place in the world during his time as its leader." | | | | | | |
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