The EU Vehicle to Evade US Sanctions on Iran

♠ Posted by Emmanuel in , at 1/31/2019 07:29:00 AM
Recently, the Trump administration's intelligence officials testified to Congress. In so doing, they contradicted the American president's beliefs and positions again and again. Being ever so shameless, Trump in so many words said these appointees of his were wrong and he was right on Syria, ISIS, North Korea, Iran, etc. For this post, US sanctions on Iran are of particular interest since--as far as the American spooks can tell--Iran has not violated the terms of JCPOA. That is, the agreement the US pulled out of in order to reimpose sanctions on Iran has been faithfully followed even after America, not Iran, reneged on...
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Rest of World Loves Good, Cheap Huawei Gear

♠ Posted by Emmanuel in , at 1/29/2019 06:38:00 PM
At Huawei HQ, do they hatch nefarious data-stealing plans or try to increase customer value? Maybe a bit of both, even? Here is a counterpoint to all the Huawei fear-mongering you read about nowadays. Encouraged by the United States to limit government purchases of Huawei networking gear, many of its allies have sharply curtailed their purchases due to security concerns. That is, Huawei is portrayed as a corporate spy working on behalf of the Community Party of China. Just today, the United States has criminally charged Huawei with stealing trade secrets from US telecoms giant T-Mobile. Fair or unfair, Huawei has acquired...
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Anticipating Brexit, UK Warehouses Overflow

♠ Posted by Emmanuel in , at 1/23/2019 03:34:00 PM
The battle of Britain...among companies seeking more warehouse space pre-Brexit If and when Brexit--of the soft, hard, or somewhere-in-between variety--finally happens, Britons are trying to anticipate the gumming up of intra-European trade by stockpiling goods in the meantime. Knowing trucks ("lorries" the English call them), ships, and planes may find loading and unloading cargoes becoming very cumbersome when the UK is no longer part of the EU and national customs procedures are reintroduced after so many decades on European goods, some folks are stocking up on imports already to prevent being stuck in a likely post-Brexit...
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Commie Corbyn: Better for UK’s EU Remainers?

♠ Posted by Emmanuel in , at 1/21/2019 04:22:00 PM
Comrade Corbyn is the opposition leader, yet he's reluctant to call for the second referendum other Labourites desire. Why? Since we are starting a new academic semester, I am beginning with the basic theoretical perspectives grounding the study of international political economy--liberalism, mercantilism (economic realism) and Marxism. Arguably, few IPE topics loom larger nowadays than the United Kingdom's impending exit from the European Union: Why would such a wealthy country even think of leaving the world's most vaunted economic integration project? Alas, it seems even in the UK in 2019, us pro-European integration...
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What Would Jesus Do About Brexit?

♠ Posted by Emmanuel in , at 1/14/2019 02:30:00 PM
The IPE Zone is a fan of arch-Remainer and Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby. While studying and working in the UK all those pre-Brexit years ago, I was amused by their government placing 26 Church of England clergy in the House of Lords. (Formally, they are the Lords Spiritual instead of the more political Lords Temporal who are everyone else.) In this supposedly secular day and age, the British are unique that way, as well as in cautioning against having a Catholic prime minister to guard against the depredations of popery and other Vatican-sourced foreign intervention. Little did I know that this nominally "ceremonial"...
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PRC's Belt-Road Initiative: Masterplan or Boondoggle?

♠ Posted by Emmanuel in , at 1/13/2019 07:36:00 PM
Bungling belies accusations of Chinese plans for regional / world transport domination. There is some dispute as to whether China's plans to connect the Asia-Pacific region and beyond with PRC-contributed infrastructure is a grand hegemonic plan or just a poorly-thought -and -executed one. American Vice-President Mike Pence sees sinister intent in describing it as a debt trap intended to tie poor countries to China in servitude via "dangerous debt diplomacy China has been engaging in in the region." That version of events goes something like this: The common perception is that President Xi Jinping’s flagship foreign...
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UK Parliament Revolts Against Hard Brexit

♠ Posted by Emmanuel in at 1/09/2019 08:07:00 PM
A true British patriot recognizes the UK's geographic location on a certain continent. UK Prime Minister Theresa May is a difficult one to pin down. While she was home minister for David Cameron (remember him?) during the run-up to the ill-fated 2016 Brexit vote, she decided to support Cameron's position to remain in the EU. After replacing him, though, she became famous for the pithy statement that "Brexit means Brexit." To be fair, she is stuck between an EU unwilling to make many compromises lest others see that they can leave the EU and still benefit from many of the privileges of membership and hardline Brexit elements...
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Thanks to Immigration, Bet on Canada's Future

♠ Posted by Emmanuel in , at 1/03/2019 02:59:00 PM
Skilled migrants are driving Canada's G7-leading population growth. Back to our coverage of international higher education in the new year: I've featured how the United States is becoming a non-destination for international students, mainly for the reason that the Trump administration is limiting their prospects for future post-educational work in the United States due to ultra-nationalist / racist immigration policies. Hard as it is for some Yanquis to understand, though, the world of higher education is much broader than the United States. There is a bona fide winner in this story of American educational and demographic...
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How CPTPP May Finish Brainless US Farmers

♠ Posted by Emmanuel in ,, at 1/01/2019 05:47:00 PM
Those Yankee steaks ain't gonna be very saleable in CPTPP countries real soon.  The geniuses who voted for Trump knew full well that he campaigned on isolating the United States politically and economically from the rest of the world. Although what he says and does seldom coincide, there was always a risk that his rhetoric would turn into action. 2018 was the year when Trump's inward-looking economic policies finally came to fruition as (marginally) more sensible sorts were sidelined or left his administration. With hardliners now feeding his worst instincts, Trump erected Fortress America on trade. The rest--including...
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