Matthew Petti is rightly appalled by Emmanuel Macron’s authoritarianism. Two slices:
Telegram is one of the last (mostly) uncensored frontiers of the internet. The messaging app allows users to message each other through both unencrypted and encrypted chats, and to create “channels” that other users can subscribe to. There’s no feed with an algorithm to manipulate, and founder Pavel Durov has committed to never sharing user information with authorities.
That has made Durov a lot of enemies. A decade ago, Durov fled Russia after his previous social media company, VKontakte, was taken over by the government. (Since then, he spent most of his time in Dubai and obtained French citizenship in 2021.) Russia banned Durov’s newer app Telegram in 2018 but then unblocked the app two years later. Countries like China and Iran have also banned Telegram.
Over the weekend, French authorities arrested Durov at the airport for complicity in fraud, drug trafficking, cyberbullying, organized crime, and promotion of terrorism. The French office in charge of combating crimes against children said that it had requested the arrest warrant for Telegram’s “lack of moderation and cooperation” in the fight against “pedocriminality.”
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Of course, America and France have important differences from Russia, China, and Iran. Along with civil rights laws, most Western countries have a large, independent tech sector wary of government interference. Silicon Valley billionaires David Sacks and Elon Musk both condemned Durov’s arrest.
Still, even the American tech sector’s independence has been weakening in the face of political pressure. Earlier this year, Congress passed a bill forcing Chinese company ByteDance to either sell off the social media app TikTok or face a ban from American app stores. Some opponents of the First Amendment are excited by the possibilities.
Also warning of the dangers lurking in France’s arrest of Pavel Durov is Nick Gillespie.
Fully domestic supply chains are more susceptible to shocks than global ones, since they allow for less competition and fewer alternative sources for goods. The U.S. baby-formula market, for example, has extremely restrictive trade barriers that block nearly all imports. It is one of America’s worst markets, susceptible to breakdown if there’s a bad storm in Michigan and full of government subsidies to try to protect consumers from the high prices that have resulted.
Democrats in pursuing their “just transition” [to “green energy”] create programs that send money to green-energy firms and environmentalist NGOs that they like. In the same way, the Republican “just transition” on trade redounded to the benefit of American steel companies, for whom Trump trade representative Robert Lighthizer worked as a lobbyist.
The lowest common denominator in each party’s “just transition” is that the rest of the U.S. economy should absorb significant costs in the pursuit of more manufacturing jobs for Americans, whether they’re making solar panels or toasters. Politicians’ arguments for the superiority of manufacturing jobs continue to weaken as the manufacturing wage premium has disappeared in recent years. Currently, the average manufacturing wage is lower than the overall average wage.
Does Gary Gensler believe there’s a limit to his power? It doesn’t appear so after the Securities and Exchange Commission this month dunned 26 financial firms for failing to track employee “off-channel” communications. The SEC Chairman wants to surveil what Wall Street traders are doing on their personal phones.
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The legal problem with Mr. Gensler’s WhatsApp sweep is that no SEC rule or law obligates firms to obtain employee communications not in its possession, such as personal phone texts. Nor are firms required to ensure perfect employee compliance with their policies. This is another example of Mr. Gensler trying to regulate by enforcement.
Firms are agreeing to pay the SEC fines and hire independent consultants to improve employee compliance with their electronic policies because it’s less costly than resisting in court. But this is one more example of the way the administrative state is intruding into the private lives of Americans.
Ramesh Ponnuru is critical of the lack, in both presidential campaigns, of policy specifics. A slice:
The morning after the Democratic convention, the Republican Governors Association came out swinging: “4 Days of DNC and Not One Dem Policy to See,” blared its statement. It’s a fair critique. Vice President Kamala Harris has been so light on detail that even her supporters can’t agree whether she is proposing price controls. As the RGA statement noted, her campaign website doesn’t even have a policy page. When her convention speech turned to policy, she gave us destinations instead of a route: She promised to “end America’s housing shortage” but didn’t say how.
But where are the policies on the other side? Donald Trump’s own campaign website touts the newly stripped-down Republican platform as his agenda. Most of it consists of promises like “Republicans will immediately stabilize the Economy by slashing wasteful Government spending and promoting Economic Growth,” with no further explanation. “Republicans will end the global chaos and restore Peace through Strength, reducing geopolitical risks and lowering commodity prices.” So that’s that, I guess.
Judge Glock and Jason Sorens explain “how ‘equalizing’ school finance hurts students and taxpayers.”
Ian Rowe gives three cheers for color-blindness.
Robin DiAngelo is accused of being a plagiarist. (HT Phil Magness)
