It’s a (Thucydides) Trap! | Russia’s Maleficent Macedonian Meddling | It’s Fun To Trade At The USMCA

“The humility required for good judgment is not self-doubt – the sense that you are untalented, unintelligent, or unworthy. It is intellectual humility. It is a recognition that reality is profoundly complex, that seeing things clearly is a constant struggle, when it can be done at all, and that human judgment must therefore be riddled with mistakes. This is true for fools and geniuses alike. So it’s quite possible to think highly of yourself and be intellectually humble. In fact, this combination can be wonderfully fruitful. Intellectual humility compels the careful reflection necessary for good judgment; confidence in one’s abilities inspires determined action.” – Superforecasting by Dan Gardner & Philip E. Tetlock

Macedonia Meddling: Russia has pulled off a 2016 US election meddling-type victory, this time in Macedonia. Prior to Sunday’s referendum an overwhelming majority of voters indicated they supported changing their country’s name in order resolve a dispute with Greece that had blocked the pathway to membership in NATO and the EU. But a flood of disinformation campaigns and “fake news”, cyber warfare and hacking, phony Facebook and Twitter accounts and secret cash payments are all alleged to have been used by Russia to depress voter turnout. It worked. Turnout fell about 36 percent short of the 50 percent required to make the decision binding on Macedonia’s parliament.

Efforts to bolster the “yes” vote by western leaders like US Defense Secretary James Mattis, German Chancellor Angela Merkel, and Jens Stoltenberg, NATO’s secretary general, were ineffective. In the end, even $8 million in US congressional funding, and other referendum funding by Britain’s Foreign Office paled in comparison to Russia’s all-out efforts. Moscow denied interfering, but its game plan has always been to prevent the expansion of western influence and democratic values in the Balkans, and elsewhere.

To The Sea: After a bloody battle in the 1800s, Chile laid claim to Bolivia’s coastline, leaving the latter landlocked. Finally, the UN’s International Court of Justice is scheduled to render a decision Monday, after five years of deliberations over Bolivia’s claims that Chile is obligated to negotiate to grant it a sovereign outlet to the Pacific Ocean. But some international law experts say the Netherlands-based body has no power to award Chilean territory, and the court has already stipulated it will not determine the outcome of possible talks. (Guardian)

Jean-Claude Van Damned: In the Swedish nod to the #MeToo movement, Jean-Claude Arnault, husband of a member of the Swedish Academy that awards the Nobel prize for literature and powerful man found guilty of rape, has been sentenced to two years in prison after being accused by at least 18 women. The academy admitted it was told about allegations of sexual assault involving Arnault in 1996, but did nothing about it. (NPR)

Go Wait Out In The Halls: A Japanese politician in the Kumamoto city assembly keeps being frustrated in her attempts to make the council more family-friendly. Last November she was forced to leave the assembly chamber because she brought her seven-month old child into work with her, after her requests for permission to breastfeed him in the chamber or for daycare to be provided in the building, were rejected. Last Friday she was thrown out again for speaking while eating a cough drop. There is no ban on eating and drinking in the chamber, but the woman’s critics claimed she had damaged the assembly’s integrity by addressing other members with a lozenge in her mouth. (Guardian)

– “A Warning From Europe: The Worst Is Yet to Come: Polarization. Conspiracy theories. Attacks on the free press. An obsession with loyalty. Recent events in the United States follow a pattern Europeans know all too well.” (Atlantic)

It’s a (Thucydides) Trap!: America’s trade war with China is ramping up, and so is the War of Words. Several incidents occurred last week that resulted in China’s cancelling an important, annual, high-level security meeting originally scheduled for mid-October in Beijing with Defense Secretary Jim Mattis. President Trump said in a UN speech Wednesday that as a result of his tough trade policies China was attempting to interfere in the upcoming midterm elections. Later that day he said Beijing was placing propaganda ads in newspapers like the Des Moines Register to target farmers whose products were being disproportionately affected by tariffs. A US foreign policy official told a crowd gathered for a celebratory occasion at the Chinese Embassy in Washington that America was determined to compete with China, language usually not uttered at formal events.

The Trump administration also imposed sanctions on a Chinese state military company for buying weapons from Russia, while announcing its own sales of $330 million in military equipment to Taiwan. Something else particularly prickly was a Pentagon announcement that B-52 bombers had been flying over the East and South China Seas in its “continuous bomber presence in the region”. Beijing claims exclusive rights to almost all of the South China Sea and strongly opposes American military patrols there. China’s Foreign Ministry had signaled last week that the US arms sale to Taiwan threatened to cause “severe damage” to “bilateral cooperation in major fields”, one example of which was refusal to allow an American warship to make a port visit to Hong Kong in October.

Additional Read: “Chinese warship in ‘unsafe’ encounter with US destroyer, amid rising US-China tensions.: A US Navy ship had an “unsafe” interaction with a Chinese warship Sunday while the US vessel was conducting a freedom of navigation operation near the disputed Spratly Islands in the South China Sea, causing the US ship to maneuver “to prevent a collision,” according to US defense officials.” (CNN)

It’s Fun To Trade At The USMCA: Robert Lighthizer, President Trump’s chief trade negotiator, hammered out an agreement Sunday night that will update the 25-year-old NAFTA agreement between the US, Canada and Mexico. On Monday Trump said the new agreement, to be called the United States-Mexico-Canada-Agreement, or USMCA, fulfilled his campaign promise to rip up the “worst trade deal ever made” and put in place something that will help American workers and businesses. Trump defended his tough trade tactics, saying “Without tariffs, we wouldn’t be talking about a deal,” adding “Just for those babies out there that keep talking about tariffs.” (NYT)

– “The Republican Party Abandons Conservatism: The conservative virtues remain real virtues, the conservative insights real insights, and the conservative temperament an indispensable internal gyro keeping a country stable and sane.” (Atlantic)

– “Prehistoric art hints at lost Indian civilisation: The discovery of rock carvings believed to be tens of thousands of years old in India’s western state of Maharashtra has greatly excited archaeologists who believe they hold clues to a previously unknown civilisation, BBC Marathi’s Mayuresh Konnur reports.” (BBC)

– “Zika Love Stories: Three years ago, thousands of babies were born with brain

damage in Brazil, after their mothers contracted the Zika virus during pregnancy.” (BBC)

– “Kids’ Brainpower Tied to Exercise, Sleep and Limited Screen Time: At least 60 minutes of physical activity a day, nine to 11 hours of sleep a night, and no more than two hours a day of recreational screen time were tied to higher mental test scores.” (NYT)

– “‘This guy doesn’t know anything’: the inside story of Trump’s shambolic transition team” (Guardian)

– “Why targeted ads are the most brutal owns: Examining the highly 2010s phenomenon of getting owned by the algorithm.” You can now secretly look at you SO’s Instagram to see if they’re cheating AND find out what to get them for their birthday. (Vox)

– “Your Notifications Are Lying to You: Ding! This needs your attention right now, notifications seem to say. Boing! It might be an emergency. Or, just as often: Boop! Somebody you love might want to talk to you. We get hundreds of notifications every day, and they are almost all lies.” The sexy singles are actually in your tri-state area…(Lifehacker)

– “Religion is about emotion regulation, and it’s very good at it” (Aeon)

– “Digital IDs Are More Dangerous Than You Think: From airports to health records systems, technologists and policy makers with good intentions are digitizing our identities, making modern life more efficient and streamlined.” (Wired)

– “Esther Perel: ‘Fix the sex and your relationship will transform’: Esther Perel’s breathtakingly frank therapy podcasts – Where should we begin – not only make for juicy listening, they’ve revitalised the stale private lives of millions.” Ah the old, “Who came first? The chicken or the egg?” fix. (Guardian)

“If anyone tells you that a certain person speaks ill of you, do not make excuses about what is said of you but answer, “He was ignorant of my other faults, else he would not have mentioned these alone.” – Epictetus

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