Trump trade war with Mexico and China

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January 27, 2017

Donald Trump at a campaign rally in Miami on September 16. Reuters
Steve Wynn sounds jubilant these days.
On Thursday, the Las Vegas casino billionaire gave his quarterly address to shareholders of Wynn Entertainment.
Business at his new hotel and casino on the Chinese territory of Macau is growing as he would like, and — for the first time in a long time — the mogul known for his bombastic tirades against the Chinese and American governments seems pleased with politics.
When a worried Wall Street analyst asked him whether he thought trade spats between President Donald Trump and a nationalistic Chinese government might hurt his business, he sounded confident.
«As you know I am acquainted with the administration. Several of us within in our business were sitting 30 feet from Trump when he took his oath on Friday,» he said.
«There isn’t a leader in America or a leader in China that doesn’t understand that when these two countries come together on an intelligent basis the world is better … It gives me long-term confidence, in spite of what happens in the short term, verbally. »
Actually, trade wars start verbally, and Trump so far has been sticking to his verbal commitments. Earlier Thursday he told a crowd in Philadelphia that he would throw out the US’s regional trade deals and negotiate them all one by one. He would give nations 30 days to comply with his offer or he would put up a tariff.
Later that day the news broke that he was considering putting a 20% tax on all goods from Mexico. The president of Mexico, Enrique Peña Nieto, had already canceled a meeting with the White House scheduled for next week because Trump tried to threaten him into paying for a wall on the border between the US and Mexico.
The president of Mexico’s national conference of governors, Gov. Graco Ramirez of Morelos, told a Mexican newspaper that Trump had declared «war» on Mexico.
«With Trump, dialogue is exhausted,» Ramirez told El Universal. «It doesn’t make sense to sit down with him. He doesn’t change his attitude or his position. »
Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto. Reuters
This kind of response from Mexico isn’t out of the ordinary.
«The presumption seems to be that nations will just roll over, and that’s just not the way it happens,» said Lee Branstetter, a professor of economics and public policy at Carnegie Mellon who is also a senior fellow at the Peterson Institute for International Economics. «There’s nothing in the history of international trade… that shows this would work. »
Trade wars are not good for stocks. They are also not good for jobs or the overall economy either. A trade war with Mexico would kneecap the auto industry , forcing executives in Detroit to make hard decisions about American jobs and car prices. It would make clothes made in Mexico more expensive, too, most likely forcing retail jobs to take a hit.
And of course, there’s the retaliation that could come of it — the unforeseen consequences.
«The problem with raising walls against foreigners is that they can retaliate against us by raising their own walls. When you save a job, you lose a job,» Branstetter said.
But this is what Trump was elected on — building walls, protecting manufacturing jobs, and ripping up the US’s deals with other countries. That is the stuff of trade war. That is the stuff of the business community’s nightmares.
«Trump can either please Wall Street or please the people in those Midwestern towns,» Branstetter said, «but he can’t do both. »
There is no such thing as being a little protectionist. Once a country slaps on a tariff it unleashes a chain of events beyond its control. It is a game of tit for tat, and in a global economy there is plenty of tat for America’s tit, so to speak.
And, as Peña Nieto’s canceled meeting with Trump showed, countries are not solely transactional. He called it off after politicians in his own country shamed him for kowtowing to Trump even a little bit. This will happen over and over again. Countries are more than businesses — they have values and pride. When those are violated, deals leave the table (if they were ever there in the first place).
This will only be more pronounced when Trump takes on his other favorite trade enemy: the Chinese. His tirades are already grating on the country’s leadership, and like Peña Nieto, the Chinese leadership has to consider measures of its respect, prestige, and status.
Some things are more important than money, and for China one of those is the «One China» policy under which the US does not recognize Taiwan as its own sovereign nation but as a part of China.
In a rare interview on an American news network, China’s foreign ministry spokesman, Lu Kang, stressed the importance of this norm, most likely because Trump already violated it by taking a call from the president of Taiwan before he took office. China’s foreign ministry spokesman, Lu Kang, on NBC. NBC, YouTube
«Because this issue touches upon China’s core interest by no means is this something that could be negotiated or used as a bargaining chip,» Lu said. «One China policy 100%. »
You see, in this complex world, some things are not another deal to be won.
On the campaign trail, Trump made a lot of different kinds of promises to different kinds of people, from billionaire businessmen like Wynn to struggling families in the American heartland. It had the effect, partly, of helping all of his supporters see in him what they liked and ignore the rest.
This is how Trump was able to please the businessmen and the populists. Two diametrically opposing groups decided to ignore what they didn’t like and heard what they did. They voted for the Trump they wanted to see.
But the truth is Trump will have to choose between one of the groups. The business community needs open markets and stability. Trump’s base wants a closed market and the destruction of the status quo. Eventually, that conflict will be fully understood as it plays out in the real economy.
You cannot run the US economy on promises. You cannot run it on threats, either. At a certain point, a 20% tariff on Mexico will catch up with you. Ripping up trade agreements left and right so that you can overhaul them with all the tact of a member of the Gambino crime family — that will also catch up with you.
It will catch up with you (and the rest of us) in the form of inflation. Being forced to buy US steel will make things more expensive for all kinds of manufacturers. The cheap South Korean TV people buy at Walmart will be gone.
We are a country of strawberries in winter, a country of giant companies with supply chains that span the globe. We are not hobbits. We are the richest country on the planet. Picking fights to diminish us will do just that — diminish us.
Strap in America, we have a trade-war monger in the White House.

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Refugee 'lost hope' in Syria, but rediscovered it in the U. S.

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January 27, 2017

It was the snowiest winter Park City had seen in years. Nour Haji, wearing a T-shirt despite the freezing temperatures, backed his white Toyota Camry toward a snowbank to turn around.
“How has your night been?” he asked, peering into the rearview mirror at his Lyft passenger in back.
Just over a year ago, Haji, 26, was still living in Turkey, having fled his home in Syria and become a refugee. He had longed to go to the United States ever since he was a teenager, when he begged his father to let him study there.
He arrived in Utah with his mother and sister in late 2015 and started working as a ride-hailing driver a few months ago. The side job paid decently and was a great chance to keep working on his English.
Back in Syria, he was always at the top of his class in English. He liked to watch American movies and invent conversations in his head to practice, consulting a translating app on his phone whenever he got stuck. Now it was paying off.
But people like Haji will no longer be allowed into the United States under an executive order signed by President Trump on Friday. The order suspends refugee admissions for 120 days and indefinitely bans refugees from Syria.
Haji and his family, who are Kurdish, fled their home in central Aleppo in 2012. The Syrian conflict had started a year earlier, and though heavy bombing wasn’t yet a staple of life in the northwestern Syrian city, conditions had already become difficult.
“There were no jobs, no safety, no money, no incomes,” he said. “You just needed to leave to be able to get a life.”
So Haji and his mother, father, sister and two brothers took refuge in a village in northern Aleppo province, where they owned a home and some land. A few days later, most of them sneaked across the border into Turkey. His eldest brother stayed behind because he worried he would not be able to support his wife and four young daughters.
Haji struggled to find work in Turkey, at one point going five months without a job. When he did work, it was long hours and little pay in construction, sales or textiles, he said.
On the advice of another brother who had moved to Canada before the war, Haji, his mother and his sister visited a U. N. office in Istanbul to see if they could start the process of resettlement. They were interviewed at length later in the capital, Ankara. His father and brother were skeptical and skipped the interview.
The process of refugee resettlement usually begins with the U. N. High Commissioner for Refugees, said Chris Boian, a spokesman for the agency.
First, a person has to meet the legal definition of refugee: somebody who has been forced to flee his or her country because of war, violence, or a well-founded fear of persecution for reasons of race, religion, nationality, political opinion or membership in a particular social group.
There are vastly more refugees than countries have agreed to resettle. After screening and interviewing candidates, the United Nations refers as many as it can to third countries for consideration. Women and children at risk, victims of violence or torture, refugees with medical needs and members of persecuted minorities get priority. The agency also tries to reunify families.
Refugees do not get to choose where they will be sent. The United Nations provides host countries with lists of eligible candidates and those countries then do their own vetting and decide who gets in.
In the United States, the screening for resettlement includes a series of background checks, interviews, fingerprinting and medical checks conducted by the State Department, National Counterterrorism Center, FBI, Department of Homeland Security, Department of Defense and other intelligence agencies.
Applicants who pass all those tests then face additional screening by U. S. Customs and Border Patrol and are checked against flight watch lists before they are finally allowed to board planes to the United States. The entire process takes 18 to 24 months on average.
“Refugees are screened more carefully than any other type of traveler to the U. S.,” says an overview of the process on the State Department’s website.
Trump has ordered a review of the screening process and instructed the secretary of State and other officials to identify and put in place additional measures “to ensure that those approved for refugee admission do not pose a threat.”
Nearly two years after his initial visit to the U. N. office, Haji landed in Los Angeles with his mother and sister in November 2015. A few days later, they arrived in Salt Lake City, where they had relatives.
“The life here — it’s kind of difficult and the cultures are way different, but I’m growing used to it,” he said.
He found work as a carpet cleaner but he quit a few weeks ago because he felt the pay was too little. While he looks for other employment, he gets by with his Lyft job.
In just the first four days of the Sundance Film Festival, which started Jan. 19 in Park City, he had made $2,000, he said.
Eventually Haji hopes to go to college to study engineering.
“In Turkey and in Syria I lost my hope — I felt like maybe I’m dying,” he said. “But now, here, I have hope. I know if I work hard, in the future my life is going to be better.”
Not all members of his family have been so lucky.
They cannot go home to the city of Aleppo, which was once a thriving commercial center but has been devastated by the six-year conflict between rebels and the Syrian government.
Under the refugee program as it stood before Trump’s executive order, people with refugee status could petition for spouses and unmarried children to join them. But they faced more hurdles when it came to siblings and parents.
Now, Haji’s father and brother have no chance of moving to the United States in the foreseeable future.
“If I could, I would try to bring them tomorrow,” said Haji. “But it’s like asking, can you touch the clouds? No, you can’t.”
Haji said he had a message for Trump. “A few hundred years ago there was no America,” he said. “America was built by refugees.”
“I’m working here like any American,” he said. “I’m paying taxes. I work more jobs than maybe the average person. I’m not asking for any help. The only thing I need is to stay safe.”
So-called sanctuary cities were once places of refuge. A surge in media mergers is expected under Trump’s pro-business agenda. Chinese New Year begins tomorrow. Grocery store tomatoes are often tasteless but researchers at the University of Florida have discovered a game-changer.
A Cal State Northridge study identified up to 40 locations used for illegal sex that could be safeguarded by the addition of street lamps or the trimming of trees.
Thirteen custom cars will compete for the “America’s Most Beautiful Roadster” award, vying for a 9-foot-tall trophy and $10,000 in prize money. (Gina Ferazzi / Los Angeles Times)
Mayor Eric Garcetti speaks about the City Council’s vote on Los Angeles’ bid for the 2024 Olympic and Paralympic Games. (Video by Jeff Amlotte / Los Angeles Times)
Mary Tyler Moore was a beloved TV icon who symbolized the independent career woman. Does widespread voter fraud really happen? President Trump has signed two executive orders on immigration. The Dow Jones industrial average closed above 20,000 for the first time Wednesday.
Mary Tyler Moore was a beloved TV icon who symbolized the independent career woman. Does widespread voter fraud really happen? President Trump has signed two executive orders on immigration. The Dow Jones industrial average closed above 20,000 for the first time Wednesday.

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New US envoy to UN vows to 'show our strength'

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January 27, 2017

As US President Barack Obama prepares to leave office on January 20, here are 10 things his presidency may be remembered for.
South Carolina Gov Nikki Haley speaks at the Federalist Society’s National Lawyers Convention in Washington. (Cliff Owen, AP)
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United Nations — Washington’s new ambassador to the United Nations, Nikki Haley, vowed Friday to show US strength in global affairs and delivered a blunt warning to opponents of President Donald Trump’s policies.
«For those who don’t have our backs: we’re taking names,» Haley told reporters at she arrived at UN headquarters for her first meeting with UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres.
«We will make points to respond to that accordingly. »
«Our goal with the administration is to show value at the UN, and the way that we will show value is to show our strength, show our voice, have the backs of our allies and make sure that our allies have our back as well,» she said.
The former South Carolina governor made her first remarks at UN headquarters before presenting her diplomatic credentials to Guterres.
Their first meeting is expected to be clouded by reports of a draft executive order being prepared at the White House that could deprive the United Nations of billions of dollars in US financial support.
The United States is by far the UN’s biggest financial contributor, providing 22 percent of its operating budget and funding 28 percent of peacekeeping missions, which currently cost $7.8 billion annually.
The 45-year-old daughter of Indian immigrants said she was ready to push for an overhaul of the United Nations and made clear there would be cuts.
«This is a time of strength. This is a time of action. This is a time of getting things done,» Haley said.
«Everything that is working, we are going to make it better. Everything that is not working we are going to try and fix. Everything that seems to be obsolete and not necessary, we’re going to do away with,» she said.
A change at the UN
In his pledge to pursue an «America First» foreign policy, Trump has dismissed the United Nations as «just a club for people to get together and have a good time. »
Relations with Trump became tense after the Security Council adopted a resolution demanding Israel end settlement construction.
The former US administration declined to use its veto to block the measure, prompting Trump to promise that «things will be different» at the United Nations under his administration.
Tough-talking Haley echoed that stance.
«You are going to see a change in the way we do business. It’s no longer about working harder but working smarter,» she said.
Met Secretary-General
The ambassador then held a brief 20-minute meeting with Guterres who was «delighted to meet her,» said UN spokesperson Stephane Dujarric.
«It was an introductory meeting and the start of engagement with the new US administration,» he said.
Guterres, who took over from Ban Ki-moon on January 1, is also pushing for changes at the United Nations to improve its ability to respond to crises.
UN officials are eager to engage with the new US envoy on the way forward on a range of issues from key appointments to top UN posts to faltering peace efforts in Syria, Yemen and South Sudan.
Haley’s appointment was welcomed by many diplomats who notably praised her for her strong stance against racism as South Carolina governor, when she ordered that the Confederate flag be pulled down from the state capitol.
Her lack of diplomatic experience however is expected to be a challenge as she confronts a string of complex issues on the agenda of the Security Council, where the United States is one of the five veto-wielding powers.
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How Trump cuts affect abortions in Africa

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January 27, 2017

US President Donald Trump’s ban on funding groups which support abortion has infuriated many global health organisations who say it will unintentionally lead to more pregnancies, abortions and deaths in Africa.
Supporters of the ban say it protects the fundamental right to life.

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Apple formally joins Partnership on AI

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January 27, 2017

Apple has formally joined the Partnership on AI; it joins other tech giants including Facebook, Alphabet/DeepMind, Microsoft, Amazon and IBM. Today’s inauguration into the company formalises a partnership that already existed between Apple and the AI body.
The Partnership on AI was established to study and formulate best practices on AI technologies, to help advance the concept of artificial intelligence amongst the public, and to serve as a platform for discussion about AI and its influences on people and society.
The Partnership also announced the inaugural Board of Trustees which is made up of six independent board members and six corporate board members. The board members are:
Until recently , Apple has stuck to old habits with regards to AI; it kept very quiet about what it was doing. Last month, this changed; it released its first artificial intelligence research paper about teaching AI to recognise objects using simulated images. Hopefully, with it joining the partnership, more of its findings will make their way out to the public.
Source: Partnership on AI via The Verge

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Microsoft puts more team into Visual Studio Team Services

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January 27, 2017

Microsoft’s Visual Studio Team Services cloud-based application lifecycle management service is being fitted with improvements in team alignment and deployment, mobile access, Git repos, and Node.js capabilities.
The enterprise agile Delivery Plans feature previewed this week helps align teams by overlaying several backlogs onto a delivery schedule, or iterations. Users can tailor plans to include the backlogs, teams, and work items they want to view, and interactive plans allow for adjustments as projects proceed. Featured as part of sprint 112 of Team Services , the Delivery Plans extension is available at the Visual Studio Marketplace.
«This feature is designed to enable you to look across teams and see how work is aligned,» Microsoft’s Brian Harry, vice president for cloud developer services, said. «This is still a very early preview, and we have lots of plans to continue to evolve it, but there’s enough functionality there for you to try it and start giving feedback. «
Microsoft also is releasing a preview of a mobile-friendly work item form for Team Services. The form is accessible on a mobile device via @mentions or by accessing work items from within new account pages. Optimized controls like area and iteration selectors, multiline text fields, and tag creation/removal history are included. Microsoft is still working on optimization, mobile pull requests, views, and other functions.
With the upgrade, Microsoft is fulfilling a common request by offering finer-grained permissions on Git repos. Users can be given permissions to create repos without having full administrative control over them.
Team Services also is set to add a capability to run build tests using Visual Studio 2017 , an upgrade to the IDE that’s now in a release candidate stage. For Node.js and JavaScript, Team Server feeds will be able to transparently proxy and cache feeds from npmjs.com, the Node package manager ; developers will only need to download a package once, with future requests for that package served directly from a Team Services account.
Other improvements rolled out in Team Services during the next week include a build editor that simplifies build definition creation, and branch policy capabilities that group required and optional policies into sections for better clarity. Microsoft also is improving the comments capability for pull requests, with additional decorations to identify new comments. Most improvements offered in Team Services will make it into the behind-the-firewall Team Foundation Server ALM server with TFS 2017 Update 1.
More about Microsoft Technology

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Rocket Internet opens its first engineering hub in Asia

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January 27, 2017

Rocket Internet is increasing its focus on Asia after it opened its first engineering hub in the region.
Bangkok, Thailand, is the location of the center, which will house a tech team that carries out work for Rocket Internet’s portfolio of startups. The firm currently has 20 people at the base in Thailand, and it said it plans to more than double that headcount before the end of this year.
The focus is very much on mobile, given that it dominates Asia as the primary method of internet connectivity. The Bangkok hub is head by former Lazada executive Sohil Gilani, who is chief product officer for Asia Pacific Internet Group (APACIG) — the joint venture that Rocket Internet operates in partnership with telco Ooredoo.
“Bangkok is poised to become the tech capital of Southeast Asia. We look forward to tapping into this talent of world class developers, product managers and designers,” Gilani said in a statement.
Rocket Internet has similar engineering hubs in Berlin, the location of its global HQ, and Portugal, but this is its first for Asia. Back in 2015, the German firm made a change to its approach to the region , moving its focus on new businesses from capital intensive, commerce-based efforts to more nimble and lean startup-type operations. APACIG’s roster of 14 startups includes budget hotel network ZenRooms and travel booking site Jovago.

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Alibaba’s Ant Financial is buying MoneyGram for $880M to expand its global presence

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January 27, 2017

Alibaba is taking a big step into the U. S. — but it isn’t necessarily what you might think.
Its affiliate Ant Financial has revealed it is buying U. S. payments firm MoneyGram for $880 million. Ant Financial is paying $13.25 per share for NASDAQ-listed MoneyGram, a jump on the $11.88 price it held at the beginning of trading on Wednesday. The deal is subject to regulatory approvals and is expected to close in the second half of this year.
Dallas-based MoneyGram is a service that handles cross-border currency transfers — remittance payments — in close to 200 countries, where it claims to have 350,000 physical locations. The company recorded $1.4 billion in revenue in 2015 , but just 13 percent of which was from digital transactions highlighting its massive offline presence.
This acquisition is in line with Ant Financial’s ongoing globalization push.
The firm backed Indian mobile payment firm Paytm back in 2015 — with Alibaba then joining it in doubling down via a further investment — while it has also expanded into Southeast Asia by acquiring a stake in Thailand-based Ascend Money. Those deals expand its tentacles beyond China, where Ant Financial’s Alipay is the dominant mobile payment service with 450 million users.
MoneyGram’s global reach vastly outstrips that of Paytm or Ascend money, and Ant Financial said in a statement that it “will provide greater access, security and simplicity for people around the world to remit funds, especially in major economies such as the U. S., China, India, Mexico and the Philippines.”
Ant Financial is tipped to go public in the next year or two, potentially in China, eschewing the path taken by Alibaba which held a record U. S. IPO worth $25 billion in 2014. Last year, Ant Financial raised a colossal $4.5 billion funding round at a valuation of $60 billion. Investors included sovereign wealth fund China Investment Corp (CIC), CCB Trust, a subsidiary of China Construction Bank, China Life, China Post Group, China Development Bank Capital and Primavera Capital Group.

Apple joins Amazon, Facebook, Google, IBM and Microsoft in AI initiative

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January 27, 2017

Following Bloomberg’s report , the Partnership on AI to Benefit People and Society (what a name) officially announced that Apple is joining other tech companies as a founding member of the AI initiative. Companies will work on research projects, AI best practices and more.
The Partnership on AI was officially unveiled back in September 2016. At the time, Amazon, Facebook, Google, IBM and Microsoft were the only founding members. Apple, Twitter, Intel and Baidu didn’t participate in the initiative.
But Apple was already enthusiastic about the project, so today’s news is more about formalizing the company’s involvement. Siri co-founder and CTO Tom Gruber is going to represent Apple. You can find the full board of trustees on the partnership’s website.
In other news, six independent individuals are also joining the board based on their past achievements when it comes to AI. Dario Amodei (OpenAI), Subbarao Kambhampati (Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence & ASU), Deirdre Mulligan (UC Berkeley), Carol Rose (American Civil Liberties Union), Eric Sears (MacArthur Foundation) and Jason Furman (Peterson Institute of International Economics) will participate in the discussions.
While the Partnership on AI has yet to clarify its areas of work, you can expect to see research papers on AI. The companies could write about ethics, inclusivity and privacy as these are hot topics. The first meeting is taking place on February 3rd.
Artificial intelligence is great, but it needs some ethical supervision in order to benefit everyone. The Partnership on AI could also be a great lobbying tool, proving that tech companies are acting responsibly. It’s a good way to win everyone’s trust.
Finally, Apple couldn’t miss out on this opportunity if it wants to hire some of the best AI engineers. Apple shows that it has a seat at the AI table. That’s why engineers working for the company also published a research paper. Now that it’s getting more competitive to hire the best AI talent, these signs are becoming increasingly relevant.

Putin, Trump plan phone chat

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January 27, 2017

President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin are scheduled to have their first phone call since Trump became president, according to CNN.
Russia has said U. S. relations «completely fell apart» during President Obama’s second term. Russia has expressed confidence in Donald Trump’s presidency.
Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev previously said in a Facebook message, «We are ready to do our share of the work in order to improve the relationship. » He referenced «the new administration,» however; he did not mention Trump by name.
Reuters reported that the Kremlin had said previously that no information was immediately available about when the leaders would have the meeting.