In 2004, an unusual crime wave swept cities around the world. Some called it the great drain robbery. Under cover of darkness, thieves were stripping manholes of their heavy iron covers, leaving streets perforated with sudden drops into sewage tunnels. …
Leftists should relish Trump’s revolution
In his 1910 bestseller, The Great Illusion, the journalist Norman Angell aimed to demonstrate that, so interwoven were the globalised industrial economies sustained by British world hegemony, war would be economic madness, and so unthinkable. The coming years did not …
What MAGA can teach Labour
“Globalisation is over,” Keir Starmer announced in The Telegraph earlier this week. And for once he’s right: despite Donald Trump’s humiliating tariff climbdown at the behest of bond vigilantes, the world has changed dramatically. The five-decades-long fever dream of global …
The paper that destroyed world trade
Despite issuing a 90-day tariff reprieve, President Trump has effectively dynamited the foundations of the global free-trade regime. The dust hasn’t even begun to settle, but the critiques of Trump’s “Liberation Day” gambit mostly come down to: he’s stupid, and …
Extremists are coming for Poland
The parishioners had set up heat lamps on the richly carpeted floor, but last night’s frost still clings to the air. It mingles with a thick haze of incense, filling the nave, catching rays of sunlight creeping in through the …
China is ready for battle
Donald Trump boasted that world leaders were “kissing my ass” as they scrambled to negotiate tariff deals with the United States. At a fundraising dinner this week in Washington, the President taunted his purported sycophants: “Please, sir, make a deal. …
Is this the end of Erdoğan?
Freshly-shaved, in a pressed shirt and exhibiting the merest hint of a pot-belly from all those kebabs on the go, Ekrem İmamoğlu, the mayor of Istanbul, knotted his blue tie while standing in his dressing room at home. “Hundreds of …
The Left can’t go back to free trade
President Trump’s “Liberation Day” tariffs have drawn condemnation not just from the libertarian Right, but also from many progressives. Opponents on the Left and centre-left argue that Trump’s gambit will leave Americans poorer, weaken the nation, and harm developing countries …
Why I’m standing up to Canada’s Liberals
At a time when reason is desperately needed, Maxime Bernier has become one of only a few voices of reasons in Canada. “We are not at risk. We are a sovereign country,” the leader of the People’s Party of Canada …
Trump’s Gorbachev moment
In the late Eighties, the sclerotic Soviet economy appeared doomed. It seemed to many that Mikhail Gorbachev and his free-market reforms were the only hope of avoiding collapse. But Gorbachev only ever seemed to get halfway. He declared that central …
Tariffs will awaken the American Dream
For decades, the United States provided a market that was unlimited for most exporters, enabling countries large and small to transfer their populations from marginally productive farms in overcrowded villages to low-tech industries producing garments, footwear, simple hand-tools and such …
Trump needs an off-ramp
Markets around the world are reeling in response to President Trump’s “Liberation Day” tariff hikes. Judging by the stock-market plunge, investors in the United States have assessed that publicly traded companies are worth trillions of dollars less than they were …
Can Trump win the tariff wars?
The international financial markets are the closest thing we have to a global consensus view on economics. And the wisdom of this crowd is usually greater than that of your average politician. More often than not, the crowd wins. In …
Why Trump keeps saving TikTok
TikTok spent 75 days living on borrowed time. ByteDance, the company that controls the platform, now has another 75 days to go before it has to comply with congressional legislation demanding that it lose its Chinese ownership or face a …
What incels think of Adolescence
“Jamie was an incel because he was a weak spoiled terminally online bullied outcast. If he were just better at sports or if sluts wanted to go out with him, he wouldn’t have been an incel.”
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