Kishore Mahbubani
NOV 22, 2016
In undermining the grouping's unity on the South China Sea, China is shooting itself in the foot.
China is making some serious strategic mistakes in its dealings with Asean. It is sacrificing its long-term interests in favour of short-term objectives and its global interests in favour of regional concerns. And, in the process, it is undermining a critical catalyst to its peaceful rise.
China's peaceful emergence as the No. 2 power in the world is a modern geopolitical miracle. In 1980, its share of global GDP in purchasing power parity terms was 2 per cent - far less than the 22 per cent the United States accounted for. By 2014, China's share had overtaken the US'. Normally such great-power transitions are accompanied by competition and conflict. Instead, China emerged peacefully. Why?
Many factors were responsible. Deng Xiaoping's wise geopolitical advice to "hide and bide" China's strength was a key factor. He also called on the Chinese "to swallow bitter humiliation". This they did. But it is impossible to swallow bitter humiliation forever. It was inevitable that China would eventually lose its patience and lash out against perceived maritime provocations by Japan and Asean. We can only hope that these recent outbursts have had a cathartic and calming effect on the national psyche.
Yet China's actions with Asean show that the anger has not abated. It is commonly believed that Chinese pressure led Cambodia to veto the Asean joint communique on the South China Sea in 2012. Similarly, China likely persuaded Cambodia, Laos and Thailand to walk away from the agreed Asean statement, later indiscreetly leaked by Malaysia.
Tuesday, November 22, 2016
[The Angle] Ideas to Further Refine the CPF System
Jan 20, 2016
IPSC
By Christopher Gee
The CPF return formula has been “tweaked” significantly to improve the progressivity of the system in recent years with the addition of initial balance layers that attract higher rates of interest; most recently as high as 6% on balances up to $30,000 in the Retirement Account.
I’m not sure you can find a better return-risk trade-off out there anywhere in the private markets, and the return is structured to cater to the large majority of CPF members’ needs and risk profile; they should satisfy all but the most risk-hungry, most likely top quintile CPF members for whom their CPF payouts are likely to be a minor component of their overall retirement financial plans.
In some respects, the Government is best placed to absorb some investment risks that individuals find very difficult to mitigate, such as that of sequence risk or inflation risk. Amongst the most persuasive arguments to further improve CPF returns would be to add some element of inflation protection, again perhaps structured to protect the most needy CPF members first.
IPSC
By Christopher Gee
The CPF return formula has been “tweaked” significantly to improve the progressivity of the system in recent years with the addition of initial balance layers that attract higher rates of interest; most recently as high as 6% on balances up to $30,000 in the Retirement Account.
I’m not sure you can find a better return-risk trade-off out there anywhere in the private markets, and the return is structured to cater to the large majority of CPF members’ needs and risk profile; they should satisfy all but the most risk-hungry, most likely top quintile CPF members for whom their CPF payouts are likely to be a minor component of their overall retirement financial plans.
In some respects, the Government is best placed to absorb some investment risks that individuals find very difficult to mitigate, such as that of sequence risk or inflation risk. Amongst the most persuasive arguments to further improve CPF returns would be to add some element of inflation protection, again perhaps structured to protect the most needy CPF members first.
Friday, November 18, 2016
Facebook fake-news writer: ‘I think Donald Trump is in the White House because of me’
By Caitlin Dewey
November 17, 2016
What do the Amish lobby, gay wedding vans and the ban of the national anthem have in common? For starters, they’re all make-believe — and invented by the same man.
Paul Horner, the 38-year-old impresario of a Facebook fake-news empire, has made his living off viral news hoaxes for several years. He has twice convinced the Internet that he’s British graffiti artist Banksy; he also published the very viral, very fake news of a Yelp vs. “South Park” lawsuit last year.
But in recent months, Horner has found the fake-news ecosystem growing more crowded, more political and vastly more influential: In March, Donald Trump’s son Eric and his then-campaign manager, Corey Lewandowski, even tweeted links to one of Horner’s faux-articles. His stories have also appeared as news on Google.
In light of concerns that stories like Horner’s may have affected the presidential election, and in the wake of announcements that both Google and Facebook would take action against deceptive outlets, Intersect called Horner to discuss his perspective on fake news. This transcript has been edited for clarity, length and — ahem — bad language.
November 17, 2016
What do the Amish lobby, gay wedding vans and the ban of the national anthem have in common? For starters, they’re all make-believe — and invented by the same man.
Paul Horner, the 38-year-old impresario of a Facebook fake-news empire, has made his living off viral news hoaxes for several years. He has twice convinced the Internet that he’s British graffiti artist Banksy; he also published the very viral, very fake news of a Yelp vs. “South Park” lawsuit last year.
But in recent months, Horner has found the fake-news ecosystem growing more crowded, more political and vastly more influential: In March, Donald Trump’s son Eric and his then-campaign manager, Corey Lewandowski, even tweeted links to one of Horner’s faux-articles. His stories have also appeared as news on Google.
In light of concerns that stories like Horner’s may have affected the presidential election, and in the wake of announcements that both Google and Facebook would take action against deceptive outlets, Intersect called Horner to discuss his perspective on fake news. This transcript has been edited for clarity, length and — ahem — bad language.
Wednesday, November 16, 2016
When the facts don’t matter, how can democracy survive?
Catherine Rampell
Opinion writer
October 17 2016
Americans — or, at least, a particular subset of Americans — have had enough of experts, facts, math, data. They distrust them all.
This rising cynicism, sown recklessly by opportunistic politicians, will not only make it increasingly difficult for policymakers to make good choices and govern peacefully; it could also become a significant economic challenge.
The latest evidence of this anti-evidence trend comes from a Marketplace-Edison Research Poll released last week.
The survey found that more than 4 in 10 Americans somewhat or completely distrust the economic data reported by the federal government. Among Donald Trump voters, the share is 68 percent, with nearly half saying they don’t trust government economic data “at all.”
Opinion writer
October 17 2016
Americans — or, at least, a particular subset of Americans — have had enough of experts, facts, math, data. They distrust them all.
This rising cynicism, sown recklessly by opportunistic politicians, will not only make it increasingly difficult for policymakers to make good choices and govern peacefully; it could also become a significant economic challenge.
The latest evidence of this anti-evidence trend comes from a Marketplace-Edison Research Poll released last week.
The survey found that more than 4 in 10 Americans somewhat or completely distrust the economic data reported by the federal government. Among Donald Trump voters, the share is 68 percent, with nearly half saying they don’t trust government economic data “at all.”
How Trump crushed naysayers with a coalition of the forgotten
ChannelNewsAsia
Nov 9, 2016.
WASHINGTON: Donald Trump was right. Countless others were wrong.
The pundits and pollsters who said the former reality TV star could not win the U.S. presidency, the Republicans who shunned him, the business leaders who denounced him and the Democrats who dismissed him failed to fully understand the depth of his support.
In a stunning victory over Democrat Hillary Clinton, Trump stuck to a plan that worked to perfection in the Republican primary, a campaign built around his blunt-talking celebrity persona, his command of social media, and his anti-establishment message of change.
“Ours was not a campaign, but an incredible and great movement,” Trump said in his victory speech on Wednesday.
Nov 9, 2016.
WASHINGTON: Donald Trump was right. Countless others were wrong.
The pundits and pollsters who said the former reality TV star could not win the U.S. presidency, the Republicans who shunned him, the business leaders who denounced him and the Democrats who dismissed him failed to fully understand the depth of his support.
In a stunning victory over Democrat Hillary Clinton, Trump stuck to a plan that worked to perfection in the Republican primary, a campaign built around his blunt-talking celebrity persona, his command of social media, and his anti-establishment message of change.
“Ours was not a campaign, but an incredible and great movement,” Trump said in his victory speech on Wednesday.
Trump Won Because Voters Are Ignorant, Literally
Democracy is supposed to enact the will of the people. But what if the people have no clue what they’re doing?
BY JASON BRENNAN
NOVEMBER 10, 2016
OK, so that just happened. Donald Trump always enjoyed massive support from uneducated, low-information white people. As Bloomberg Politics reported back in August, Hillary Clinton was enjoying a giant 25 percentage-point lead among college-educated voters going into the election. (Whether that trend held up remains to be seen.) In contrast, in the 2012 election, college-educated voters just barely favored Barack Obama over Mitt Romney. Last night we saw something historic: the dance of the dunces. Never have educated voters so uniformly rejected a candidate. But never before have the lesser-educated so uniformly supported a candidate. Trump supporters might retort: “That’s because Trump supports the little guy and Clinton helps the already privileged college grads.” But that’s false: Trump supporters in the primaries had an average income of about $72,000 per year. They aren’t rich, but make more than the national average and more than Clinton supporters.
Trump owes his victory to the uninformed. But it’s not just Trump. Political scientists have been studying what voters know and how they think for well over 65 years. The results are frightening. Voters generally know who the president is but not much else. They don’t know which party controls Congress, what Congress has done recently, whether the economy is getting better or worse (or by how much). In the 2000 U.S. presidential election, most voters knew Al Gore was more liberal than George W. Bush, but significantly less than half knew that Gore was more supportive of abortion rights, more supportive of welfare-state programs, favored a higher degree of aid to blacks, or was more supportive of environmental regulation.
Just why voters know so little is well-understood. It’s not that people are stupid. Rather, it’s that democracy creates bad incentives.
BY JASON BRENNAN
NOVEMBER 10, 2016
OK, so that just happened. Donald Trump always enjoyed massive support from uneducated, low-information white people. As Bloomberg Politics reported back in August, Hillary Clinton was enjoying a giant 25 percentage-point lead among college-educated voters going into the election. (Whether that trend held up remains to be seen.) In contrast, in the 2012 election, college-educated voters just barely favored Barack Obama over Mitt Romney. Last night we saw something historic: the dance of the dunces. Never have educated voters so uniformly rejected a candidate. But never before have the lesser-educated so uniformly supported a candidate. Trump supporters might retort: “That’s because Trump supports the little guy and Clinton helps the already privileged college grads.” But that’s false: Trump supporters in the primaries had an average income of about $72,000 per year. They aren’t rich, but make more than the national average and more than Clinton supporters.
Trump owes his victory to the uninformed. But it’s not just Trump. Political scientists have been studying what voters know and how they think for well over 65 years. The results are frightening. Voters generally know who the president is but not much else. They don’t know which party controls Congress, what Congress has done recently, whether the economy is getting better or worse (or by how much). In the 2000 U.S. presidential election, most voters knew Al Gore was more liberal than George W. Bush, but significantly less than half knew that Gore was more supportive of abortion rights, more supportive of welfare-state programs, favored a higher degree of aid to blacks, or was more supportive of environmental regulation.
Just why voters know so little is well-understood. It’s not that people are stupid. Rather, it’s that democracy creates bad incentives.
One of Hillary Clinton’s top aides nailed exactly why she lost
By Chris Cillizza
November 14 2016
In The Washington Post's terrific oral history of the 2016 presidential campaign, there's a quote from Hillary Clinton media consultant Mandy Grunwald that is remarkably prescient. Responding to a question about how Clinton could lose despite being ahead in every traditional measure of the campaign, Grunwald said:
November 14 2016
In The Washington Post's terrific oral history of the 2016 presidential campaign, there's a quote from Hillary Clinton media consultant Mandy Grunwald that is remarkably prescient. Responding to a question about how Clinton could lose despite being ahead in every traditional measure of the campaign, Grunwald said:
How it will happen would be that the desire for change was greater than the fear of [Donald Trump], the fear of the risk. . . . That’s something we talked about very early on — how do we make sure that people aren’t comfortable making that leap because they’d like to go for change. . . . The question is what’s the more salient question when they go vote.
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