| | | | Why Americans Should Care About Trump's Tariffs | | | The Trump administration's tariffs on steel and aluminum imports are about more than just these products or even the danger of tit-for-tat escalation. The tariffs are effectively an attack on the World Trade Organization—and the very global system that has so benefited the United States, The Economist argues. "Trump seems to think trade is a zero-sum affair, in which a deficit is a sign of a bad deal. But the vast improvement in living standards after the second world war went hand in hand with a rapid expansion in world trade over eight trade rounds, each of which lowered barriers. Imports are in fact welcome, because they benefit consumers and spur producers to specialize in what they do best," The Economist says. "Without the WTO, cross-border trade would continue—it is unstoppable—but the lack of norms and procedures would leave disputes to escalate. The fewer the rules, the more scope for mercantilist mischief and backsliding. Trade policy could be captured by special interests. Military power would hold greater sway in trade disputes than economic fair play. Transnational investment could drain away. As a vast continental economy, America would lose less from this than other countries. It would nonetheless lose a lot, including a pillar of the system that has underpinned its post-war political influence." | | So, How Hard Is It Exactly to Deploy a Nerve Agent? | | British police said Wednesday that former Russian military official Sergei Skripal and his daughter were deliberately poisoned using a nerve agent. Ian Sample notes in The Guardian that while such agents "are not hard to make in principle…in practice it takes specialized facilities and training to mix the substances safely."
"The raw materials themselves are inexpensive and generally not hard to obtain, but the lethality of the agents means they tend to be manufactured in dedicated labs. The main five nerve agents are Tabun, which is also known as GA and is the easiest to make, Sarin, Soman, GF and VX," Sample writes.
"VX was invented in the UK in the 1950s, and is the most powerful nerve agent. It is mostly absorbed through the skin, and tends to take effect in the space of minutes. It can also be turned into a vapor by heating it, in which case the effects are almost immediate." "[T]he British government has been relatively timid about making a fuss regarding the murders of Russians on its soil. Although British police and intelligence have pushed for a stronger response by London, that has not been forthcoming. The difficult reality is that enormous Russian investments in British firms and real estate have translated into political influence, and no British government has been eager to rock the boat over a few mysterious murders," Schindler says.
"The Skripal hit may change that. The matter has been handed to elite counterterrorism police for investigation, while…the British cabinet convened a top-level COBRA meeting to discuss the case. Although London is officially keeping an open mind, MI5 is reported to believe that the Kremlin stands behind this ugly operation. It's difficult to imagine who else wanted the old spy dead…"
| | The Lesson from Italy? Europe is "Nearly Ungovernable" | | | The populist success in Italy's election Sunday was about more than Italian politics, writes Helen Thompson in The New York Times. It proved that the political center is as good as dead in Europe. "Since the Maastricht Treaty was signed in 1992, establishing the European Union and laying the groundwork for the creation of the euro, policy on a range of issues from budgets to asylum have been taken beyond the control of democratically elected national governments," Thompson says. "At the same time, participation in the eurozone has required governments to forsake policy tools that their predecessors had used during times of economic crisis. Since 2010, eurozone membership can also demand acquiescence to the European Central Bank, which can essentially ask for and veto national economic legislation." "The result? Much of Europe has become nearly ungovernable. As voters across the Continent see their ability to influence policy taken away, they have lashed out, neutering the traditional center and giving rise to disruptive populists. Italy's election, in other words, says much about everything that's wrong with the European Union." | | The Al Capone Playbook for America's Guns Crisis | | Despite the outcry after the Florida school shooting last month – and the broad public support for tougher gun laws – it's hard to imagine Congress introducing an outright ban on assault rifles. But lawmakers looking for a Second Amendment-friendly solution could try another approach to discouraging their use, tapping a playbook from the 1930s, suggests Stephen Mihm for Bloomberg View.
"Many reformers [in the 1930s] wanted an outright ban on machine guns, silencers, sawed-off shotguns, and other weapons in the gangster arsenal. But [then-Attorney General Homer] Cummings knew that could easily invite a constitutional challenge," Mihm writes.
"So Cummings looked to another piece of federal legislation for inspiration: the Harrison Narcotics Tax Act of 1914, which imposed taxes on the production, distribution, and sale of opiates. Understanding full well that the power to tax was the power to destroy, Cummings proposed that Congress impose a $200 transfer tax each time someone bought or sold a machine gun -- or approximately $3,700 in today's money.
"As gun control historian Adam Winkler has observed, this strategy was akin to the one used by the feds to take down Capone: tax evasion charges. And like that strategy, the gun tax worked. The popularity of these weapons effectively collapsed."
"None of this amounted to a ban on machine guns: It was still possible to buy them even if almost no one did. And that's the lesson for today. If Congress is leery about trampling on gun rights but wants to do something about assault rifles, perhaps they should take some inspiration from Homer Cummings."
| | Will Egypt's Strongman Make It Official? | | Egyptians head to the polls later this month. But with President Abdel Fatah el-Sisi seemingly assured of victory, it's already clear that the big story for Egypt is not the election, but what comes next – an effort to extend presidential terms and formalize the country's autocracy, writes Michael Wahid Hanna in the Washington Post.
Sisi's regime "has sought to squelch any potential opposition activity before it becomes an emerging or credible threat. This repression has gone beyond obvious political targets and has produced a stultifying environment in which prosecutors have initiated outlandish legal actions, shocking even staunch regime supporters," Hanna writes.
"Such an environment does not set the stage for a convincing renewal of the Sisi regime's legitimacy. But that is not the purpose of this month's electoral exercise. Rather, it is a procedural hurdle to clear before the much more consequential effort of constitutional change." | | | | | | |
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