The Pew Research Center has done a poll in 38 countries on which issues or nations represent the greatest security threats. Not surprisingly, the major concerns vary across different regions and different economic conditions. In many countries, the US is regarded as a greater security threat than some other countries. Generally speaking, countries with poorly performing economies tend to think that the condition of the global economy is a security threat. But the most striking finding is how many people in the world regard climate change a a major threat.
Researchers at the Finnish Meteorological Institute have made a graphic that illustrates global warming in the 20th century. The graphic clearly indicates that the phenomenon is truly global and not just a local phenomenon. The graphic also shows that the process of warming seems to be accelerating.
For those of us who regularly read and watch the news, The Economist has some dispiriting information. The news media apparently has little effect on how some citizens determine their political preferences. Indeed, among some constituencies, more would prefer shutting down or fining media outlets that broadcast stories that are “biased or inaccurate”. Freedom of the press is a cardinal value of a liberal society, but some of our colleagues do not regard that freedom as sacrosanct. And it does not appear that they are willing to entertain information that conflicts with their beliefs.
“The most frequently used indicator to compare recessions is GDP. According to the International Monetary Fund, Venezuela’s GDP in 2017 is 35% below 2013 levels, or 40% in per capita terms. That is a significantly sharper contraction than during the 1929-1933 Great Depression in the United States, when US GDP is estimated to have fallen 28%. It is slightly bigger than the decline in Russia (1990-1994), Cuba (1989-1993), and Albania (1989-1993), but smaller than that experienced by other former Soviet States at the time of transition, such as Georgia, Tajikistan, Azerbaijan, Armenia, and Ukraine, or war-torn countries such as Liberia (1993), Libya (2011), Rwanda (1994), Iran (1981), and, most recently, South Sudan.
“Put another way, Venezuela’s economic catastrophe dwarfs any in the history of the US, Western Europe, or the rest of Latin America.”
Poverty is so pervasive in the country that 74% of Venezuelans have involuntarily lost 19 pounds in weight, in-patient mortality in hospitals have increased ten-fold, and infant mortality in hospitals has increased 100-fold.
Cobalt is an indispensable mineral for many electronic devices and 60 percent of the world’s cobalt comes from the Democratic Republic of Congo. The miners who dig the cobalt from deep within the earth get paid very little for doing incredibly dangerous work. The Washington Post has an article on the conditions in the mines and it reports that the miners earn between $2 and $3 a day and that many of these miners are children. It is deeply disturbing that so much wealth is generated by cobalt and that such a small amount goes to the people who actually make it possible to use the mineral.
One of the more nettlesome issues in world politics is the discrepancy between nations and states. Nations self-identify–they are groups of people who believe that there is something distinctively different about their group that separates them from others. By this criterion, there are about 2,000 communities with populations greater than 100,000 which could qualify as nations. But there are only 194 states in the international system as determined by membership in the United Nations. Thus, the term “nation-state” is highly misleading. Even within nations there are disputes about what constitutes membership in the group. No where is this issue more interesting than in the case of the American nation: who belongs?
Democracy Now conducted a survey of voters in the 2016 election posing many questions to voters that touch on this question, and the survey yielded some fascinating results. There seems to be widespread and strong support for three criteria: 1) Respect for American political institutions and laws; 2) American citizenship; and 3) a willingness to accept diverse and religious backgrounds. But the third criterion breaks down among different groups within the two major political parties, and the difference between most American and voters who voted for Donald Trump in the 2016 primaries is dramatic. According to the study:
“Thus, substantial numbers of Americans, particularly among Republicans and Trump primary supporters, appeared to embrace a conception of citizenship predicated on birthplace and especially Christian faith. Both criteria polarized the parties more than any other, suggesting that the politics of immigration will remain fraught if the debate revolves around whether adherents of non-Christian religions—especially Muslims—can be truly American.”
“We have reaffirmed our position towards North Korea, that what we are doing, we do not seek a regime change; we do not seek the collapse of the regime; we do not seek an accelerated reunification of the peninsula; we do not seek an excuse to send our military north of the 38th parallel. And we’re trying to convey to the North Koreans we are not your enemy, we are not your threat, but you are presenting an unacceptable threat to us, and we have to respond. And we hope that at some point, they will begin to understand that and that we would like to sit and have a dialogue with them about the future that will give them the security they seek and the future economic prosperity for North Korea, but that will then promote economic prosperity throughout Northeast Asia.”
More than anything, North Korea is responding to what it perceives as an existential threat by the US. Until the US appreciates the North Korean perception, there is little hope for any progress. Indeed, until the US indicates that it understands the North Korean perception, then all US pressure on the country merely confirms its fears.
Climate change will affect everyone on the planet, but some areas of the world will be more seriously affected than others. One region of special concern is South Asia. New research indicates that some areas in the region may be uninhabitable if climate change occurs unchecked. The abstract to the research paper reads as follows:
“….a wet-bulb temperature of 35°C can be considered an upper limit on human survivability. On the basis of an ensemble of high-resolution climate change simulations, we project that extremes of wet-bulb temperature in South Asia are likely to approach and, in a few locations, exceed this critical threshold by the late 21st century under the business-as-usual scenario of future greenhouse gas emissions. The most intense hazard from extreme future heat waves is concentrated around densely populated agricultural regions of the Ganges and Indus river basins. Climate change, without mitigation, presents a serious and unique risk in South Asia, a region inhabited by about one-fifth of the global human population, due to an unprecedented combination of severe natural hazard and acute vulnerability.”
The wet-bulb temperature refers to the combination of heat and humidity.
US President Trump tweeted criticism of China for not acting forcefully enough on the North Korean nuclear program. His tweets were as follows:
“I am very disappointed in China. Our foolish past leaders have allowed them to make hundreds of billions of dollars a year in trade, yet…
4:29 PM – 29 Jul 2017
…they do NOTHING for us with North Korea, just talk. We will no longer allow this to continue. China could easily solve this problem!”
4:35 PM – 29 Jul 2017
It is difficult to gain the active support of a potential ally to solve a mutual problem by public criticism. The Chinese have responded to these tweets in an article in Xinhua:
“But emotional venting cannot become a guiding policy for solving the nuclear issue on the peninsula.”
It appears that China is increasingly frustrated with President Trump. Zhang Wenzong has written an editorial for Global Times which is very critical of American foreign policy and has some sharp words for the apparent clumsiness of the US foreign policy team. The situation surrounding policy toward North Korea has become increasingly tense over the last two weeks and one should watch this situation very carefully.
The Washington Post has published an article that summarizes recent scientific research on the issue of climate change. The studies, generally speaking, paint a rather pessimistic view of the future and suggest that there is only a 5% chance that the planet can avoid a less than 2°C temperature increase by the end of this century.
Global Land-Ocean Temperature Index
Opposition leaders in Venezuela were forcibly removed from their homes the day after a sham election for a constituent assembly to rewrite the Venezuelan constitution. The only people allowed to run for the assembly were people selected by the government of President Maduro. The Venezuelan people have made clear what their sentiments are on the matter, but the government has increasingly used force to entrench its power further. It is difficult to expect more from the Venezuelan people in the face of the willingness of the government to use force to gain compliance–the outside world must step up and demand that the Venezuelan government protects its own democratic principles.
Today marks the centenary of the beginning of the battle of Passchendaele which begin on 31 July 1917 and ended on 10 November 1917. It was the third battle in what was known as the Ypres Salient. In those three battles, beginning in 1914, more than 800,000 soldiers on both sides lost their lives. Those battles are testimony to the absolute futility of the war and the foolish tactics employed by the generals who were completely oblivious to the realities of the first industrial war.
The Ruins of Passchendaele
Mitchell Blatt has written an op-ed on how to think about “illiberal” regimes. Some governments, such as Viktor Orban’s Hungary, Poland’s rule under the Law and Justice Party, and perhaps even Donald Trump’s America, have been moving in a direction which does not uphold the idea of individual rights as vigorously as liberal politics demand. Blatt writes that the key to thinking about liberal governments is the emphasis on constitutional rule that protects individual rights, not necessarily an emphasis on the idea of voting rights. It is an intriguing essay and provokes one to think more clearly about the nature of liberalism.
Khairuldeen Al Makhzoomi and Adel Albdeewy have written a very interesting essay on the Qatari crisis which I found truly enlightening They identify three major political axes in the Middle East, led by Saudi Arabia, Iran, and Turkey. Each of these alliances in the region have different and often cross-cutting objectives and the controversy over Qatar has thrust these differences into the open. The perspective is a refreshing and more intelligent one than the one that emphasizes the role of US interests in the region. Indeed, the US turns out to be almost irrelevant, except as a genuinely destabilizing force, to the dynamics of this issue which could potentially explode into open conflict in the region.
Offshore banking is a tactic that is often used to avoid taxation. Many individuals and corporations use offshore banking by moving money to places with low taxation in a manner that their home countries cannot identify. The Apple corporation, for example, plays a tax of 0.005% on its profits in Europe. Given the nature of offshore banking, we do not really have good estimates of how much tax revenue is lost, but responsible estimates suggest that between $500 and $650 billion of tax revenues are lost annually by this technique. According to Oxfam:
“Over the last few decades, however, figures show that the tax contributions of large corporations are diminishing as governments compete in a race to the bottom on corporate taxation. Over the last thirty years, net profits posted by the world’s largest companies more than tripled in real terms, from $2 trillion in 1980 to $7.2 trillion by 2013”.
Needless to say, the costs of setting up an offshore account are prohibitively expensive for those with lesser means. Globalization works for some and against others.
The United States Effective Corporate Tax Rate (1947-2011)
At least 13 people died across Venezuela in protests against the election of the constituent assembly. With the opposition boycotting the election, there is little question that the constituent assembly will be approved. But Venezuela has been censured by many other countries for the actions of President Maduro. And the US, which has already levied sanctions on specific individuals in the Venezuelan government will probably add additional sanctions against Venezuela. It is hard to see how Maduro can emerge from this crisis even with a rewritten constitution.
On this day in 1966, “Wild Thing” by The Troggs reached #1 on the Billboard charts. It was their only real hit, but it has endured.
Tomorrow is the day Venezuelan President Maduro has designated for the election of a constituent assembly to rewrite the Venezuelan constitution. His opponents believe that the assembly will simply write a constitution to further embed his power and have promised to boycott the vote and to protest against the referendum. He, in return, has banned any demonstrations or public activities. In other words, tomorrow will be a confrontation that promises to tear the country apart. We will have to watch carefully what happens and to assess what outcomes are possible for the troubled country.
It is a serious mistake to think that the concentrations of wealth that we are experiencing at the beginning of the 21st century are anomalous. One of the striking features of human society is its tolerance of extreme wealth in the hands of a single person Unfortunately, that pattern is ubiquitous in history and is not unique to European-based societies. Go to the site and click on Visual Capitalist’s infographic to read the information about each person in a more comfortable format.
I posted on 25 July about China’s military build-up along the North Korean border. At that time, I discounted the idea that China had any plans to invade North Korea (and still do not believe that that is a likely outcome). But some others have a different explanation: that China does indeed intend to take over North Korea in order to have direct access to the Sea of Japan. In what China regards as an unequal Treaty, the territory blocking China’s access to the Sea of Japan was ceded to Russia in the Convention of Peking which ended the Second Opium War in 1860. Most likely, China would not initiate hostilities but rather take advantage of turmoil created by a US action against North Korea. If one wishes to be conspiratorial (and to use the pure lens of Realpolitik), it would not be unprecedented for the US and China to agree to such a course of action secretly. The US could easily concede North Korean territory as the price for Chinese support for regime change in North Korea.
Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif was removed from office by an order from the country’s Supreme Court. The order stems from the evidence implicating Sharif in financial fraud coming from the leaks from what are called the Panama Papers, evidence of financial accounts in Panama designed to avoid official scrutiny and taxation. Sharif’s Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) party will still control the Parliament and Sharif will undoubtedly continue to wield power behind the scenes. Nonetheless, Pakistan is likely to experience a period of great political instability in the near future.
“On July 27, the US Congress passed a new bill on tougher anti-Russia sanctions. This measure is further proof of the Unites States’ extremely hostile foreign policy. Hiding behind its sense of superiority, the United States arrogantly ignores the stances and interests of other countries.”
It remains to be seen how President Trump will respond to the bill which was passed by overwhelming majorities in both houses of Congress.
Foxconn is a Tawainese electronics company that recently signed an agreement to open a new manufacturing facility in the US state of Wisconsin. It produces most of the iPhones in the world from its factory in China and has long been a source of controversy. There was a rash of suicides at the factory because of the harsh working conditions, with many of the people committing suicide by jumping off the roof of the factory. Foxconn’s first response to those suicides was to place nets around the roofs. Wisconsin beat out six other US states for the factory, and provided huge financial incentives to the company to locate in the state. The cost to Wisconsin for the tax incentives? $237,500 per job.
The US Treasury announced new sanctions against Venezuela for its continuing violations of human and democratic rights under the Maduro Administration. The sanctions are part of a concerted effort by a number of states to persuade Maduro not to hold an election this coming Sunday for a Constituent Assembly to rewrite the Venezuelan constitution. There have been 4 months of violent protests against the policies of Maduro and few believe that the election on Sunday will create an assembly that fairly represents the interests of the Venezuelan people.
From Today’s Protests in Venezuela
The Taliban has seized the Afghan provinces of Paktia, Faryab and Ghor from government control. The Taliban have made steady gains against the central government in Kabul, raising powerful questions about the long-term strategy of the US in the country. The US invaded Afghanistan in October 2001 and after 16 years of war, the Taliban control at least 40% of the country. At what point does the US concede that the military strategy has not worked?
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