China Churns Ahead
October 20, 2020
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“The oak fought the wind and was broken, the willow bent when it must and survived.” ― Robert Jordan
“The person attempting to travel two roads at once will get nowhere.”— Xun Kuang
China Churns Ahead
(Xu Hui via Getty Images)
As the US and Europe face an accelerating wave of new coronavirus cases, China has gotten things under control, with almost no local transmission of the virus. After months of lockdowns and restrictions, people were once again out and about for “Golden Week” public holidays in early October — China’s the first major holiday since the pandemic began. The country’s economy is rebounding quickly, demonstrating that a fast economic recovery is possible when the virus is brought firmly under control.
Other major economies are recovering from last spring’s contraction, when shutdowns caused output to crater. But China is the first major economy to report growth that significantly surpasses where it was at this time last year, surging 4.9 percent in the July-to-September quarter compared with the same months last year. That means the country is almost back up to the 6 percent pace of growth it was reporting before the pandemic.
America’s economy will likely report a third-quarter swell, but it is still well behind pre-pandemic levels. The fact that the US and other European nations are still seeing more new infections, and must continue playing catch-up, means China’s lead could further widen in the months ahead.
Driving China’s swift economic recovery has been huge investments in construction — highways, high-speed rail lines, and other infrastructure projects. The expansion of the country’s economy is so vigorous that it is set to dominate global growth, accounting for at least 30 percent of the world’s economic growth this year and in the future. Chinese companies make up a greater share of global exports, manufacturing consumer electronics, personal protection equipment, and other goods in high demand at present. China is also buying more iron ore from Brazil, more corn and pork from the US, and more palm oil from Malaysia.
While the country’s recovery may be enviable, it’s unlikely other nations will be quick to emulate Beijing’s model for restoring growth. China’s methodology for keeping local transmission of the virus at or near zero involves comprehensive cellphone tracking of the population, weeks-long lockdowns of neighborhoods and cities, and costly mass testing in response to even the smallest outbreaks.
When It Comes To Hacking, Russia Goes For The Gold
(Carl Court via Getty Images)
- A joint operation of the UK National Cyber Security Centre and US intelligence agencies have uncovered a Russia planned cyber-attack on the Japanese-hosted 2020 Olympics and Paralympics in Tokyo in an attempt to disrupt the world’s premier sporting event. The Russian cyber-reconnaissance work covered the Games organizers, logistics services, and sponsors and was underway before the Olympics was postponed due to COVID-19.
- The evidence is the first indication that Russia was prepared to disrupt the summer Games, from which all Russian competitors had been excluded because of persistent state-sponsored doping offenses. The UK was the first government to confirm details of a previously reported Russian attempt to disrupt the 2018 Winter Olympics and Paralympics in Pyeongchang, South Korea.
- The disruption of both the winter and summer Olympics was said to have been carried out remotely by the GRU unit 74455. The UK said that, in Pyeongchang, the GRU’s cyber-unit attempted to disguise itself as North Korean and Chinese hackers when it targeted the opening ceremony of the 2018 winter Games, crashing the website so spectators could not print out tickets and crashing the WiFi in the stadium.
- Key targets also included broadcasters, a ski resort, Olympic officials, service providers, and sponsors of the games in 2018, meaning the objects of the attacks were not just in Korea. On Monday, the US indicted six Russian military intelligence officers for their alleged role in hacking attacks on the 2018 winter Olympics, and on targets of the “NotPetya” malware, including a Pennsylvania hospital. (Guardian)
Secret Talks… With Syria?
- A newspaper aligned with the Syrian government, Al Watan, reports that two senior US officials met with the head of Syria’s intelligence agency in his office in Damascus last August for secret talks concerning the fate of missing American journalist Austin Tice, sanctions, and US military presence in Syria.
- Citing unnamed sources, Al Watan said the trip was not the first visit by high-level US diplomats and that three similar visits to Damascus have taken place in past years. The newspaper stressed that during the August visit, the Syrian government refused to discuss “kidnapped” Americans and sanctions until effective talks on US withdrawal from Syria were underway.
- Austin Tice is an award-winning freelance journalist who was abducted in Syria in 2012 and is thought to be held there by the Syrian government or allied forces. President Trump said last March that he was “working very hard with Syria” to free Tice, and urged Damascus to work with the US. “If you think about what we’ve done, we’ve gotten rid of the ISIS caliphate in Syria. We’ve done a lot for Syria,” Trump said. “So it would be very much appreciated if they would let Austin Tice out. Immediately.” (WaPo)
Additional World News
- Hack of all trades: US charges Russian military hackers with attacking American companies, targeting foreign elections (NBC)
- Alexey Navalny Has the Proof of His Poisoning (New Yorker, $)
- China-Taiwan tensions erupt over diplomats’ fight in Fiji (BBC)
- Trouble for Taipei: The United States Needs to Get Serious About Defending Taiwan From Chinese Aggression. Here’s How. (Foreign Policy)
- China delivers a barrage of criticism at US climate policies (WaPo, $)
- Thai authorities seek to censor coverage of student protests (AP)
- Trump says Sudan to be removed from terrorism list (AP). At the pretty price of $335 million.
- Revealed: chaining, beatings and torture inside Sudan’s Islamic schools (Guardian)
- Police Raid in France Targets Islamist Links After Teacher’s Killing (NYT, $)
- Q in the queue: QAnon Presence Grows at UK Anti-Lockdown Protests (Vice)
- At Front Lines of Armenia-Azerbaijan Fighting, Death and Fear Reign (NYT, $)
- Bolivia’s Election: Evo Morales Ally Luis Arce’s Win ‘Strong And Clear’ (NPR). From exile to shattering expectations.
COVID-19
- America’s Last Line of Defense for a Safe Vaccine (Scientific American)
- Letting Coronavirus Rip Through US is Very Dangerous (Time)
- The pursuit of herd immunity is a folly – so who’s funding this bad science? (Guardian)
- How the Trump admin devastated the CDC—and continues to cripple it (Ars Technica)
- ‘Out of Control’: When Schools Opened in a Virus Hot Spot (NYT)
- N.Y. Shuts Down Hasidic Wedding That Could Have Had 10,000 Guests (NYT)
Why They Flipped After Four Years
- Many Democrats and independents who couldn’t bring themselves to vote for Hillary Clinton in 2016 are coming out in droves to vote for Joe Biden in 2020. Reasons given for failure to support Clinton in 2016 ranged from viewing her as part of a corrupt political establishment to just not trusting her. And for those who sat out 2016, voted for third-party candidates or backed Trump, the question becomes: why back Biden?
- A rationale for their vote that comes up repeatedly: Biden is simply more acceptable to them than Clinton was, in ways large and small, personal and political, sexist and not, and those differences help them feel more comfortable voting for the Democratic nominee this time around. Biden also benefits, of course, from the intense desire among Democrats to get President Trump out of office.
- Biden now leads Trump in many public polls by bigger margins than Clinton had in 2016. In private polling and focus groups, voters express more positive views of Biden than of Clinton, though they know far less about his decades in political office, according to strategists affiliated with both Democrats’ campaigns.
- “The Republicans did a fantastic job of making Hillary Clinton seem like the devil for the last 20-plus years, so she was a hard sell,” said a county Democratic chairman in northwestern Pennsylvania. “It’s just a lot easier with Joe Biden because he’s a guy and he’s an old white guy. I hate saying that, but it’s the truth.” (NYT)
Donald vs. The Doctor
- Despite death threats against Dr. Anthony Fauci and his family, President Trump continues to deride America’s foremost immunologist and head of the US National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases. In a call with campaign staff on Monday, Trump called his top public health expert “a disaster” and claimed “people are tired of hearing Fauci and all these idiots” discuss ways to combat COVID-19.
- The president’s ridicule came one day after CBS’s 60 Minutes aired an interview with Fauci, in which the 79-year-old said he was “absolutely not” surprised Trump recently contracted the COVID-19 himself, because he was holding crowded events with minimal social distancing and use of masks in the days before he developed symptoms. Fauci also told CBS the White House had been controlling his media appearances. “I certainly have not been allowed to go on many, many, many shows that have asked for me,” he said, adding that restrictions had been inconsistent.
- On the campaign call, Trump said: “Every time he goes on television, there’s always a bomb, but there’s a bigger bomb if you fire him.” More than 8 million cases of COVID-19 have been recorded in the US and some 220,000 people have died. Case numbers have risen to their highest levels since July as a majority of states struggle to contain the virus. Fauci has said the US is not experiencing a second wave, because it never managed to contain the first. (Guardian)
Additional USA News
- Pelosi, Mnuchin Narrowing Gap on Stimulus, to Talk Again Tuesday (Bloomberg)
- Trump Will Leave Behind a Harsh Political Landscape (Atlantic, $)
- Let history, not partisans, prosecute Trump (WaPo, $). Time is the greatest teacher of all.
- Trump Is Losing Ground With White Voters But Gaining Among Black And Hispanic Americans (FiveThirtyEight)
- A labor without love: Trump’s Labor Secretary Is a Wrecking Ball Aimed at Workers (New Yorker, $)
- The race to be Biden’s secretary of State is already underway (Politico)
- The Evangelical Movement’s Bad Bargain (Atlantic, $)
- Storming the hill: The Most Vulnerable Incumbent In The House Is A Democrat, But Republicans Are Defending More Competitive Seats (FiveThirtyEight)
- Back to school: Many large districts are opening doors again (WaPo, $)
Pawns And Paranoia
- Chess — the game with a reputation for gravitas and class — has enjoyed a huge boom in internet play this year as in-person events have moved online and people stuck at home have sought new hobbies. But with that has come a significant new problem: a rise in the use of powerful chess calculators to cheat on a scale reminiscent of the scandals that have dogged cycling and athletics.
- One leading ‘chess detective’ said that the pandemic was “without doubt creating a crisis.” Similar problems have been reported with poker, bridge, and even backgammon. “The pandemic has brought me as much work in a single day as I have had in a year previously,” said Prof Kenneth Regan, an international chess master and computer scientist whose model is relied on by the sport’s governing body, Fide, to detect suspicious patterns of play. “It has ruined my sabbatical.”
- Chess.com, the world’s biggest site for online play, said it had seen 12 million new users this year versus 6.5 million last year. The cheating rate has jumped from between 5,000 and 6,000 players banned each month last year to a high of almost 17,000 in August. Altogether, the chess play website has closed more than 85,000 accounts for cheating since March.
- The growth in cheating and a corresponding explosion in social media discussion of the problem has created a new atmosphere of suspicion and recrimination. “Paranoia has become the culture,” said one cyber chess detective. “There is this very romantic vision of the game which is being scuppered.” (Guardian)
Additional Reads
- Thirty books to help us understand the world in 2020 (Guardian)
- Creativity to GDP: How did creativity become an engine of economic growth? (Aeon)
- The Neurology of Flow States (Nautilus)
- Doing Old Things Better Vs. Doing Brand New Things (Andreessen Horowitz)
- Don DeLillo: ‘I wondered what would happen if power failed everywhere’ (Guardian). How to write a book set in the great blackout.
- A NASA spacecraft is poised to snag the largest sample of rocks from an asteroid ever (The Verge)
- Too many Turkey Toms: Thanksgiving’s new leftovers: Turkeys too big for farmers to sell (WaPo, $)