Modest investments abroad could advance America's interests at home - by preventing pandemics from reaching our shores, by expanding markets for U.S. goods, by promoting democracy and freedom - all for less than 1% of the federal budget each year.
I come on behalf of a hardworking, creative, and resilient people, but above all a deeply generous people-a people that has learned to resist without hatred, to defend its rights without ceasing to respect others.
The World Bank's recent report argues that government intervention, when done right, can actually be an essential ingredient of economic success, reversing decades of opposition to industrial policy.
The Honorable President Donald J. Trump, distinguished guests, ladies and gentlemen, I would like to take this opportunity to express my deepest gratitude for hosting such a beautiful dinner for me and my delegation. Thank you very much for your warm feelings toward Japan and your friendship.
Starting next month, the cost of renouncing your U.S. citizenship will go down dramatically - a boon for people already shouldering the burden of paying for a major overseas move. Anyone wishing to formally shed their American citizenship is required to obtain a form called a Certificate of Loss of Nationality, and right now it comes with a whopping $2,350 fee. In April, that fee will drop by 80% to $450.
For a nation whose founding symbols were carefully engineered around the balance of peace and war, that omission is hard to read as accidental. Dropping the olive branch from the dime isn't just a design choice: it's a cultural signal.
Last week- after the Wall Street Journal broke more news about the Trump family's dodgy crypto-business dealings and before the President shared a racist video of the Obamas depicted as dancing apes-the Amazon entrepreneur Jeff Bezos decided that one of his smaller properties, the Washington Post, has proved such a drag on his two-hundred-and-thirty-billion-dollar fortune that prudence required that he obliterate much of its newsroom.
Meeting in Munich over the weekend, officials on both sides said they wanted to continue to work together. In the world of geopolitics all eyes were on Southern Germany over the weekend where the Munich Security Conference (MSC) served as the latest make or break moment for Germany-US relations. German Chancellor Friedrich Merz delivered the event's opening speech in which he acknowledged that a rift has opened up with the US, and urged trans-Atlantic partners to repair and revive trust.
This year's conference comes at a time of strained ties between Europe and the United States, after Trump threatened to take over Greenland and criticised "decaying" and "weak" European nations. Russia's war against Ukraine, set to enter its fifth year this month, is high on the agenda, alongside efforts by European NATO members to raise their defence budgets, in line with Trump's demands, out of concern that Moscow could seek to expand into their territory.
White genocide' Carl is a right-wing firebrand who played a minor role in the first Trump administration and has more recently gained, depending on your vantage, kudos or notoriety for his theory that Anti-White Racism Is Tearing America Apart, as his book's subtitle puts it. He believes, for example, that a White genocide is underway and endorses the Great Replacement Theory (according to which elites in America and Europe are intentionally encouraging immigration to replace indigenous whites).
American diplomats are supposed to represent the nation, advocate for the interests and policies of the U.S. government, and stay on generally good terms with the country to which they're assigned. Even when they are sent to places that have an adversarial relationship with the United States, they are expected to maintain decorum while conveying messages these regimes may not want to hear.
I happened to be in Canada a week ago-in the cold and snowy mountains of Quebec-when President Donald Trump sent the text to the Norwegian Prime Minister, Jonas Gahr Store, in which he explained that, because he hadn't gotten a Nobel Peace Prize, he no longer felt "an obligation to think purely of Peace" with regard to Greenland. Canadians I spoke to seemed saddened by this latest outburst.
Since Richard Nixon was forced to resign, powerful people in both political parties have worked assiduously to ensure that their leaders would escape the consequences of their actions. Trump has evaded punishment for crimes both low (campaign-finance violations, for which he was convicted, though he will serve no time thanks to his 2024 victory) and high (his attempted overthrow of the federal government in the aftermath of his 2020 election loss, for which he was spared by the Supreme Court's decision to grant him a kingly immunity).
