| | | | Canada's Big Lesson for America | | | There are plenty of theories over why the United States appears "so divided and dysfunctional," writes Jonathan Kay in The Atlantic. But one of the best explanations might be a simple, even mundane one: Canadians don't engage in "magical thinking" about their tax dollars. "The United States is falling apart because -- unlike Canada and other wealthy countries -- the American public sector simply doesn't have the funds required to keep the nation stitched together. A country where impoverished citizens rely on crowdfunding to finance medical operations isn't a country that can protect the health of its citizens. A country that can't ensure the daily operation of Penn Station isn't a country that can prevent transportation gridlock. A country that contracts out the operations of prisons to the lowest private bidder isn't a country that can rehabilitate its criminals," Kay writes. "It's really quite simple: When Canadian governments need more money, they raise taxes. Canadians are not thrilled when this happens. But as Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr. put it, taxes are the price paid 'for civilized society.' And one of the reasons Canada strikes many visitors as civilized is that the rules of arithmetic generally are understood and respected on both sides of the political spectrum." | | From day one of the invasion of Iraq, Iran saw an opportunity to increase its influence in neighboring Iraq, writes Tim Arango in the New York Times. Fourteen years later, from politics to commerce, Tehran's influence is everywhere.
"Across the country, Iranian-sponsored militias are hard at work establishing a corridor to move men and guns to proxy forces in Syria and Lebanon. And in the halls of power in Baghdad, even the most senior Iraqi cabinet officials have been blessed, or bounced out, by Iran's leadership," Arango writes.
"At some border posts in the south, Iraqi sovereignty is an afterthought. Busloads of young militia recruits cross into Iran without so much as a document check. They receive military training and are then flown to Syria, where they fight under the command of Iranian officers in defense of the Syrian president, Bashar al-Assad.
"Passing in the other direction, truck drivers pump Iranian products -- food, household goods, illicit drugs -- into what has become a vital and captive market."
| | Why China Cracked Down…On Winnie the Pooh | | | The systematic removal of the name and images of Winnie the Pooh by China's censors over the weekend is just the latest example of the Chinese Communist Party's tightening control over what its citizens can view online, writes Peter Hartcher.
"[C]ensorship of political debate has become so thoroughgoing that the authorities don't merely repress dissent or criticism but even subtle references and symbols," Hartcher writes in the Sydney Morning Herald.
"It may seem ridiculous, but for the Chinese Communist Party this is deadly serious. Nothing is more important than 'stability maintenance', meaning the preservation of the party's monopoly on power. A key reason that China's Communist Party is the most durable authoritarian regime on Earth is that there is no alternative. No one has been able to create any national organization that could conceivably turn its hand to politics. This is a reason that the Falun Gong, or Falun Dafa, movement was so ruthlessly repressed. Not because it was political -- its emphasis is on spiritual meditation -- but because it had a national organizing structure." | | And You Think Fake News Is a Problem Now? | | Machine learning is poised to make fake news even more realistic – and a much, much bigger problem, writes Noah Smith for Bloomberg View.
"Already, lip-synching technology can literally put words in a person's mouth. This is just the tip of the iceberg -- soon, 12 year-olds in their bedrooms will be able to create photorealistic, perfect-sounding fakes of politicians, business leaders, relatives and friends saying anything imaginable.
"This lends itself to some pretty obvious abuses. Political hoaxes -- so-called 'fake news' -- will spread like wildfire. The hoaxes will be discovered in short order -- no digital technology is so good that other digital technology can't detect the phony -- but not before it puts poisonous ideas into the minds of people primed to believe them," Smith writes.
| | The Danger of "Macronmania" | | "Macronmania" might have swept across France and beyond. But be wary of the hype – his rise was as much about luck than it was political genius, suggests Jonathan Eyal in the Straits Times. And by styling himself as a king, he is taking a very big risk.
"[T]here is no consensus for the reforms which the President proposes to introduce, and no political class invested in its success. If the measures produce the expected outcome and France flourishes, Mr Macron would be hailed as a second General de Gaulle.
"But the moment the reforms appear to flounder, he will find himself alone; the downside of personalizing power to such an extent is that responsibility ends up with only one person."
| | Maybe Trump Was Right About a Nuclear Japan: Rubin | | | Donald Trump may have had a point when he floated the idea of a nuclear Japan during the presidential campaign, argues Michael Rubin in Commentary magazine. The prospect of a nuclear-armed Japan might encourage Beijing to finally put some serious pressure on North Korea – and rethink some of its own, increasingly aggressive, security policies. "Japan is already nuclear weapons-capable: All it would need to do is assemble a bomb it already knows how to make and has the material to do so. There is Japan's historical antipathy toward nuclear weapons based on its status as the only country against which nuclear weapons were used in military conflict, but that anti-nuclear consensus is not as strong as some outsiders assume. Frankly, the prospect of a nuclear-armed Japan is the only thing that really gets Chinese officials to stand up and take notice." | | The second round of Brexit talks began Monday. Gideon Rachman writes in the Financial Times that there is growing chatter about the possibility of a second referendum. "It is now obvious that this vision of a painfree Brexit was an illusion. As the real choices become clear, the slim pro-Brexit majority could easily fall apart. That is all the more likely because opinion polls have consistently suggested that a majority of voters are not prepared to pay a personal economic price to secure Brexit," Rachman writes.
The first meeting of the U.S.-China Comprehensive Economic Dialogue, created during President Trump's meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping in April, takes place Wednesday. Wendy Cutler writes for The Hill that the talks take place "at a time when U.S. exporters and investors are becoming increasingly vocal on the plethora of barriers to the Chinese market and feel no comfort as China focuses on building up sectors like information technology and robotics, its 'strategic emerging industries.'" | | | | | | |
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