Politics
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America’s Baffling Opposition to the WHO’s Breastfeeding Resolution
It seems that any institution that is global or multilateral in nature or name elicits visceral opposition by huge swathes of the American public. While there has long been an undercurrent of insularity and outright hostility in America towards the rest of the world, it goes without saying that under the present administration — which… Continue reading
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The Decline of U.S. Global Approval
According to a Gallup poll published in January, 65 out of 134 countries surveyed saw a decline in U.S. leadership approval ratings by 10 points or more between 2016 and 2017. This includes many longtime allies and partners. Portugal, Belgium, Norway and Canada led the declines worldwide, with approval ratings of U.S. leadership dropping 40… Continue reading
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India’s Ambitious Democracy
In the spring of 1947, the eve of India’s independence from the U.K., the leaders of its independence movement made the fateful decision for their new country to be a secular, constitutional republic with suffrage for every adult citizen: more than 170 million in total. Overnight, India became the world’s largest democracy, a distinction it… Continue reading
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Operation PBSUCCESS
On this day in 1954, the CIA executed Operation PBSUCCESS, which overthrew the democratically elected Guatemalan President Jacobo Arbenz and installed military officer Carlos Castillo Armas, the first in a series of brutal U.S.-backed desposts who lasted until the 1990s. Arbenz was only the second Guatemalan leader to be elected democratically; in 1944, a popular… Continue reading
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The Countries That Give (And Receive) the Most Government Aid
In a world with vast disparities between rich and poor, tens of billions of dollars worth of aid is exchanged between nations. Citing 2014 data from the OECD, an international organization comprised mostly of wealthy countries, The Economist provides an interactive map showing which governments are donating to the most countries and how much they give to each recipient.… Continue reading
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What Worries the World
The wave of populism sweeping across the world — particularly, but not exclusively, in the West — is largely product of widespread discontent among the masses. But the causes of anxiety and cynicism vary from country to country, with each society facing its own unique challenges or trajectories. A recent poll of 25 countries conducted by… Continue reading
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Torture Doesn’t Work
As recounted in Scientific American, as early as 1631, with the publication of Cautio Criminalis by Jesuit scholar Friedrich Spee, it was discovered that torturing criminal suspects did not work. Spee came to this conclusion in the most salient way possible: The Duke of Brunswick in Germany invited two Jesuit scholars to oversee the Inquisition’s use of torture to… Continue reading
About Me
Humanist | Bibliophile | Writer | Wiki Editor | World Citizen | Esquire (J.D. / LL.M.)