Новости за 24.05.2021

Tech industry “regulation is overdue,” writes Nick Clegg, the former British deputy prime minister turned Facebook vice president of global policy. In an op-ed for CNBC today, Clegg declared that “for too long, many of these important issues”—privacy, competition, data rights—“have been left to private companies to deal with alone.” Facebook, which, besides Google, exercises more influence over what people see and read than any other entity in the world, is horrified by these developments—which... Читать дальше...

When the Supreme Court was first established in 1789, the United States was small enough that the justices could review decisions in lower courts by “riding circuit”—literally traveling by horse from courthouse to courthouse to review cases. Fortunately for the justices, Congress abolished the practice in the mid-nineteenth century: The modern U.S. now includes a small collection of island territories scattered throughout the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans—a long distance to travel even by modern standards. Читать дальше...

One night last summer, I saw a police van go up in flames, and I allowed myself to feel hope, something that had become quite foreign to me after the year’s many stupefying months. For a number of us who went out in the aftermath of George Floyd’s murder and the sacking of the third precinct in Minneapolis, it was the first time we had encountered our friends with bigger fears than our breath. “When someone put their arms around me to pull me out of the way of a swinging baton, that still counts... Читать дальше...

Hao-Yuan Cheng is a night owl. So when an alert buzzed his phone in the early morning of December 31, 2019, he saw it almost immediately. Trained as an epidemiologist, Cheng works as a health official in Taiwan’s Centers for Disease Control, inside a special unit called the Epidemic Intelligence Center. Established after the 2003 SARS outbreak, the EIC oversees a 24/7 disease surveillance system designed to identify potential outbreaks. At all times, it is trawling the world’s chatter for what could trigger the next crisis. Читать дальше...

There are a lot of hidden trip wires on the road to a greener economy. One of the biggest is the network of investor protections through which companies can sue states for enacting policies that render their investments—for example, their fossil fuel investments—worthless. And right now, the American Petroleum Institute is offering an object lesson in how that could work going forward, voicing its strong disapproval for Mexican energy policy and a not-so-thinly veiled threat.

On April 21, the far-right magazine Valeurs Actuelles launched the kind of perfectly timed volley that sends French political and media life into overdrive. It took the form of an open letter, what the French generally refer to as a “tribune.” Titled “For a return to honor of our governors,” the tribune was signed by a group of high-ranking former military officials, including 20 retired generals, who warned that “the situation is critical, France is in peril, several mortal dangers threaten her.”

Many... Читать дальше...

On Thursday, Israel and Hamas reached a ceasefire, putting a tentative end to 11 days of fighting that began with protests over the eviction of Palestinian families in the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood of East Jerusalem and a subsequent Israeli raid at the Al Aqsa mosque on the last Friday of Ramadan. In a statement praising the agreement Thursday night, President Joe Biden described talks between the United States and Israel over the past week. “In my conversation with [Prime Minister] Netanyahu... Читать дальше...

In the aftermath of a delicate ceasefire coming on the heels of 10 days of Israeli airstrikes that killed some 230 Palestinians, Gaza’s health care infrastructure has weathered serious damage: Bombs hit 17 hospitals and clinics, interrupted importation of medical supplies, and slaughtered one of the area’s top pulmonologists in charge of coronavirus response efforts. Shrapnel from one Gaza City explosion reportedly careened into the Ministry of Health offices across the street, rendering the besieged... Читать дальше...