Attention to the Unseen

Daniel H Cole and Aurelian Craiutu write: Modern democratic governments are founded on liberal principles meant to create the basis of a fair and just society. Liberalism emerged as a reaction against absolute power, in favour of individual autonomy protected by freedom of conscience and the rule of law. As the political theorist Judith Shklar put it in Political Thought and Political Thinkers (1998): ‘Liberalism’s deepest grounding is … in the conviction of the earliest defenders of toleration, born in…

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Siobhán O’Grady writes: Last year, Andrés Manuel López Obrador published a book that criticized the United States’ influence in Mexico and featured parts of speeches he made on a tour of the United States, where he called for migrant rights. He named it “Oye, Trump,” Spanish for “Listen Up, Trump.” Now he’s going to be Mexico’s next president. The leftist former mayor of Mexico City, who is also known by his initials, AMLO, has repeatedly made clear how he differs…

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Clive Irving writes: Is there a moment when a fanatical leader can be stopped before he takes a nation into the abyss? A moment when those with the moral determination to stop him can act before it is too late? These questions are not academic. Every day Trump stress tests this republic’s defenses against a demagogue. History has such moments. They need to be heeded. In Italy the moment came on Aug. 16, 1924. For more than two months, one…

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Vann R Newkirk II writes: At this rally [in Lafayette Square, Washington DC], the luminaries were there in their full brightness. Lin-Manuel Miranda, America Ferrera, Alicia Keys and other celebrities gave emotional speeches, demanding an end to this administration’s immigration policy, and providing a family-centered view of the ultimate effects of that policy. Of those, the most personal speech came from Orange is The New Black star Diane Guerrero, an American-born daughter of Colombian parents who at 14 was separated…

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BuzzFeed reports: Since April of last year, six operators sitting at a call center in Laguna Niguel, California, have fielded an astonishing range of calls for 12 hours a day. One caller asked to make a reservation at a Trump hotel. Another called to report that “a ‘coyote’ stole his cat.” Then there was the one who “requested to report Melania Trump, who is stealing caller’s taxpayer funds.” Another complained that “illegal aliens are going into her yard and taking…

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The Washington Post reports: U.S. intelligence officials, citing newly obtained evidence, have concluded that North Korea does not intend to fully surrender its nuclear stockpile, and instead is considering ways to conceal the number of weapons it has and secret production facilities, according to U.S. officials. The evidence, collected in the wake of the June 12 summit in Singapore, points to preparations to deceive the United States about the number of nuclear warheads in North Korea’s arsenal as well as…

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David Frum writes: When Westerners first began to hear of Vladimir Putin’s troll army—now some five years ago—the project sounded absurd. President Obama in March 2014 had dismissed Russia as merely a weak “regional power.” And Putin’s plan to strike back was to hire himself a bunch of internet commenters? Seriously? In a recent talk in Washington, the historian Timothy Snyder observed that Russia’s annual budget for cyberwarfare is less than the price of a single American F-35 jet. Snyder…

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Politico reports: Sen. Susan Collins took a notable phone call Thursday as she enters the eye of the Supreme Court confirmation storm: It was White House counsel Don McGahn, sounding out the moderate Maine Republican in what she called a “preliminary discussion” of the high court vacancy. Republicans control the Senate by a single seat and Arizona Sen. John McCain has been absent for months. That means any single GOP senator has enormous sway over President Donald Trump’s Supreme Court…

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The Guardian reports: North Korea has continued to upgrade its only known nuclear reactor used to fuel its weapons program, satellite imagery has shown, despite ongoing negotiations with the US and a pledge to denuclearise. Infrastructure improvements at the Yongbyon nuclear plant are “continuing at a rapid pace”, according to an analysis by monitoring group 38 North of commercial satellite images taken on 21 June. The cooling system for the plutonium production reactor has been modified and at least two…

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The Washington Post reports: On Aug. 19, 2016, Arron Banks, a wealthy British businessman, sat down at the palatial residence of the Russian ambassador to London for a lunch of wild halibut and Belevskaya pastila apple sweets accompanied by Russian white wine. Banks had just scored a huge win. From relative obscurity, he had become the largest political donor in British history by pouring millions into Brexit, the campaign to disentangle the United Kingdom from the European Union that earned…

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