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worth re-posting: https://biggeekdad.com/2014/
And:
Is silence consent? http://www.chicagotribune.com/
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Several memos before this op ed was posted, I used the term "Cold War" in my discussion about China.
Trump, at the prodding of Bolton, has come to believe China will not change under current leadership and thus is going to do everything in his power to punish China.
How can Trump accomplish this?
First, government can encourage American Corporations to do business elsewhere in Asia. Second, government can encourage American Corporations to re-locate back in America and possibly offer incentives. American corporations may finally realize they have been picked clean by China and it is in their own survivable interest to heed Trump's advice. (See 1 below.)
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Trump has been placed in a difficult position by members of The Saudi Monarchy. There are many in Congress, from both sides of the aisle, who are raising morality as the basis for breaking our relations with the Saudis.
Some are the same who saw no immorality in attacking Kavanaugh, Bork and/or Thomas. Others are supportive of The Supreme Court decision (Roe v Wade) that has allowed some 60 million fetuses to be aborted and denied a constitutional right to life because a fetus was determined to be only a partial person or some such legal manipulation.
Trump is a practical man and has less regard for moral niceties. For this he is due criticism but he also has a point about reality and how, in the face of emotion, much harm is often done and the consequences are even worse. (See 2 below.)
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Trump's tax reform regarding "opportunity zones" is going to be a potential boon for black families and improving their living conditions but Republicans are too dumb to know how to translate this into deserved support and votes from the black community. How sad.
And yes, to make matters worse, it will be accomplished by providing incentive's to those evil's who can afford to take advantage of the tax benefits - the rich. (See 3 below.)
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Avi comments. (See 4 below.)
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Our cousin Sam gets a new position after serving as Consul General In Los Angeles. He will soon become Chairman of Keren haYesod: (See 5 below.)
Founded: December 1920
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Americans have a deep distrust of government which they have come to believe favors the elitist class because they have the power and money to gain access. This is why, in my opinion, voters frequently prefer to divide control of Congress between the two main political parties.
Normally I have no basic problem with this approach but I also believe now is not the time to seek gridlock. There are too many issues that need to be addressed and frittering away the opportunity to address them simply to stop/impeach Trump is not wise.
Trump has been effective as a president in terms of what he has sought to do and accomplished to date. He grates on a lot of people and certainly the Trump haters cannot abide him but throwing the baby out with the wash could also prove, rash, costly and counterproductive. Democrats and the radicals who speak for them have nothing to offer that is rational.
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The concerns I expressed about the market seems to be justified but I certainly was not aware of bomb threats. Nothing surprises me, however, because hate begets hate.
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Dick
1)
Let’s Vote on a China Cold War
The administration needs a mandate to rip up the relationship with Beijing.
By Holman W. Jenkins, jr
Coherence may finally be raising a semi-welcome head when it comes to the Trump trade agenda. Gary Cohn was last seen in Bob Woodward’s book snatching off President Trump’s desk a letter ending the South Korea free trade deal. Yet in a public forum recently Mr. Cohn gave a defense of the administration’s policy on China: “If we are not getting paid specifically by the Chinese for what we have invented and the Chinese are just stealing it and knocking it off, the global economy, globalization doesn’t work.”
Christopher Balding, a Western economist who soured on China’s evolution firsthand from living there, was first to notice (and applaud) elements in the U.S.-Mexico trade deal aimed at excluding China from the North American auto market.
Larry Kudlow let the cat out of the bag this week when the presidential adviser said tariff negotiations with China are dead in the water.
Business leaders who expect the China trade dispute to end the way the Mexican and Canadian disputes did had better wake up. It won’t be over soon. When a tariff is announced on Chinese production, expect it to stay on forever. By now, the U.S. has imposed initial duties on about half of China’s exports to the U.S.—worth $250 billion. More are coming.
U.S. companies are starting to be publicly pressured to reduce their reliance on Chinese suppliers and markets. Vice President Mike Pence, in a speech this month, applauded unnamed U.S. business for turning away from the China market if it requires surrendering to Beijing’s technology theft agenda, adding, “More must follow suit.” Apple has been laughing off Mr. Trump’s demands for factories in the U.S. Maybe it shouldn’t.
It’s been a strange few weeks in this regard. Bloomberg News produced a detailed and elaborate account of China’s sneaking hidden components into U.S. motherboards. All the U.S. companies named in the story issued stringent denials.
Then there’s the odd matter of Broadcom and its latest U.S. acquisition target, CA Technologies. In response to Trump pressure, Broadcom has re-domiciled in the U.S. but remains a China-influenced company. CA’s roll-up business model has made it the sole-source supplier of legacy software used in U.S. banks, hospitals and power companies. A Defense Department letter criticizing the sale is reportedly a forgery. Yet if the Trump administration means what it says, the transaction is exactly the kind that might seem suspect. Look for a resurrection of the long-defunct Coordinating Committee for Multilateral Export Controls, which once applied a stern hand to U.S. and allied companies to curb commercial technology flows to America’s adversary in the last Cold War.
But with one difference—last time we had a debate. Arthur Vandenberg and all that.
Maybe it’s time for the Trump administration to lay out for the American people just how thoroughly it intends to shake up the hugely important U.S.-China economic relationship.
By one view, China is becoming the worst enemy of its own development. It doesn’t need our help. Its surveillance and social-control agenda likely will deter its best minds from staying in China or coming back from a foreign university. The Soviet Union, in the 1980s, thought with enough bureaucratic imperative and enough stealing it could keep pace with the U.S. It couldn’t. Under Xi Jinping, China seems increasingly confused about output and value—more high-speed railways to nowhere, more towering buildings with nobody inside.
A traditional free-trade view would say if China wants to chase away foreign investment, China pays the cost, not the U.S. If China wants to tax its people to subsidize steel, solar panels and auto parts for export, we would be wise to pocket these handouts to our consumers and businesses and focus our resources elsewhere. When your adversary insists on shooting himself in the foot, let him. China’s avid pursuit of artificial intelligence worries Western experts but is likely to be employed mainly in destroying the creativity and initiative of its own people.
If the Trump boom has proved anything, meanwhile, it’s proved that American prosperity is still made at home. A better answer to China’s perverse ambitions would be to focus on renewing our own economic dynamism, building up our military and alliances, dealing with the fiscal challenge of our welfare state. These priorities are likely to guarantee American success in the coming century, not following Xi Jinping down the path of seeking foreign scapegoats for failure and heavy-handed intervention at home.
Tempted by the potentialities of technology to create the thoroughly modern totalitarian state with himself at the center, Mr. Xi is rapidly undermining the openness that lifted China out of poverty. His personal ambition—not any political necessity—seems to be driving the show. That’s a mistake the U.S. does not need to emulate.
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2) Congress Can Stand Up to the Saudis
Even if Trump won’t affirm American values, lawmakers should do so.
By William A. Galston
Hypocrisy, goes the saying, is the tribute vice pays to virtue. On Saudi Arabia, at least, President Trump is no hypocrite. Forthrightly eschewing pieties about democracy and human rights, he has made clear that he will not let the barbarous murder of Jamal Khashoggi disrupt relations with the kingdom, especially arms sales. Contracts, dollars, jobs—that’s what matters. Everything else is idle chatter.
Despite his overestimate of the size of Saudi contracts and their impact on U.S. employment, Mr. Trump regards his approach as the height of realism. In interviews this past weekend, key members of his own party disagreed. New York Rep. Peter King said that “the Saudis are the most immoral government we’ve ever had to deal with.”
North Carolina Sen. Thom Tillis dismissed the “rogue operatives” cover story: “In Saudi Arabia, you do not do something of this magnitude without having clearance from the top. We need to find out who that is and hold them accountable.” Nebraska Sen. Ben Sasse brushed aside the “struggle gone horribly wrong” narrative. “You don’t bring a bone saw to an accidental fistfight,” he said, raising the possibility of canceling the Saudi arms deal.
Tennessee Sen. Bob Corker, chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee, said he thought Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman had directed the killing. If so, he pointed out, Magnitsky Act sanctions should be targeted at the crown prince and other senior members of the chain of command. Sen. Tillis even entertained the possibility of pressuring King Salman to designate a new successor.
It fell to South Carolina Sen. Lindsey Graham to rebut the president head-on. “Our values are more important than money and jobs,” he said. America’s moral voice, he added, is “more important to the world than anything.” That’s the way U.S. presidents used to talk—and often act.
In fairness, Mr. Trump is not the first president to make the U.S.-Saudi relationship a high priority. But while previous presidents were dealing with cautious, aging kings who ruled by consensus within their extended family, Mr. Trump is confronted with a reckless young crown prince who has shouldered aside family rivals to reach the top.
Since taking command, Mohammed bin Salman has arrested the prime minister of Lebanon, detained leading Saudi officials—including members of his own family—for a ransom estimated at $100 billion, and enacted a severe crackdown on journalists and regime critics. Beyond his country’s borders, he has instigated a blockade of Qatar and plunged into a no-win war in Yemen, triggering what the United Nations secretary-general calls the world’s worst humanitarian crisis. The World Health Organization says each week witnesses 10,000 new cholera cases, and the U.N. estimates that as many as 14 million Yemenis are at risk of starvation.
President Trump appears unfazed by all this. In an interview with the Washington Post, he praised the crown prince as a strong leader who has “very good control” and can “keep things under check,” adding “I mean that in a positive way.” If maintaining control is the ultimate test of political leadership, it seems, all means to this end are within the pale.
Of course, Mr. Trump won’t distance himself voluntarily from the country he regards as the linchpin of his Middle East policy. The question is whether Congress can apply enough pressure to effect meaningful change.
Yemen is the place to start. The sale of U.S. arms to the Saudis is enabling Mohammed bin Salman’s ill-judged intervention. The Saudi claim that American precision-guided missiles would reduce civilian casualties has not been borne out. It is not clear that the Saudis care very much about these casualties, though it is occasionally useful for them to pretend that they do. Congress could invoke the Arms Export Control Act, pass a joint resolution disapproving additional arms sales, and dare the president to veto it.
An additional option, not exclusive of the first, is exercising the old-fashioned power of the purse. In its next defense authorization bill, Congress could limit the use of appropriated funds for Yemen-related operations. Without U.S. refueling missions and other support activities, the Saudi military effort eventually would grind to a halt.
This exercise of congressional responsibility would have a dual purpose: to end U.S. complicity in a moral and humanitarian disaster, and to send a credible message to Saudi leaders that the U.S. will no longer give them a blank check in the region—nor for their dismal domestic record on human rights.
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3) Opportunity Is Coming to a City Near You
The rollout of new tax incentives should prompt investment.
By Steve Glickman
The federal government’s most powerful economic weapon is the tax code, and its most pressing problem is the ailing American Dream. Enter “opportunity zones,” economically distressed communities where new investments can receive preferential tax treatment. The incentives were quietly inserted into last year’s tax-reform bill. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin recently predicted they could prompt $100 billion in private investment to low-income communities.
Treasury released its first round of opportunity-zone regulations on Friday. Tapping $6.1 trillion in potential capital gains, according to the Economic Innovation Group, opportunity zones could reshape capital markets and reinvigorate dozens of major American cities. Tax benefits for patient capital infusions will encourage U.S. taxpayers to capitalize real-estate projects, infrastructure and businesses in America’s heartland. This includes the offer of tax-free profits for investments held at least a decade.
Opportunity zones sound a bit like Jack Kemp’s enterprise zones or President Clinton’s empowerment zones. But they’re far more ambitious. I co-founded and led the Economic Innovation Group, which developed the concept and structure of opportunity zones and worked to pass it. The old zones were responsible for less than $2 billion in small-business incentives across fewer than 200 zones. Today’s program aims to drive hundreds of billions of private dollars into more than 8,700 designated zones covering nearly 12% of the U.S. and 35 million people. Even if Mr. Mnuchin’s conservative estimate is right, that translates to an average of more than $7,300 in investment for each household in these communities.
Several investors, such as Decennial Group, EJF Capital and Somera Road, have already formed “opportunity funds,” each targeting $500 million or more in capital. Many entrepreneurial fund managers are eager to join them. Yet institutional investors, major wealth managers and the largest investment banks remain on the sidelines.
They’re waiting for comprehensive guidance from the Treasury Department. Congress created the map for the opportunity-zone marketplace, but Treasury must fully implement the rules of the road. The administration’s preliminary regulations are a step in the right direction, allowing investors and fund managers to answer some threshold questions, including what kind of gains receive the incentive (capital), how funds are certified (Form 8996), and how long investors can shield their tax-free profits (until 2047).
Treasury also provided investors with more flexibility, including a 31-month timetable for opportunity funds to deploy capital into large real-estate development projects. It also published more-accommodating definitions for identifying investible businesses and property. Nevertheless, many questions remain unanswered. Foremost is whether Treasury will allow funds to recycle and reinvest capital from asset to asset as Congress intended. That’s a critical feature for scalable business investment through portfolio funds.
The Trump administration’s guidance will shape opportunity zones for years to come, determining whether the new capital flows will live up to their transformative potential.
Mr. Glickman is founder and CEO of Develop LLC, which advises on investing in opportunity funds and the opportunity-zone marketplace.
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4) High-Tech Power-Couple: Israel & South Korea
By Avi Jorisch
South Korea is consistently ranked as one of the most innovative countries, and the fuel that has powered this astonishing metamorphosis is technology. But there are also a number of challenges looming over the horizon that will hamper South Korea’s growth if not effectively addressed. As Korean policymakers, aid workers and scientists look to solve challenges, they should turn to Israel to find existing innovations that can make a difference, or create new ones together.
Since the Republic of Korea declared independence in August 1948, it has transformed its economy from one of the world’s poorest to one of the richest. Last week, Reuters issuedits annual ranking of the world’s most innovative universities, the ones doing the most to advance science, invent new technologies and power new markets. Not surprisingly, Korea had eight of the top 100 universities.
Korea’s development and rapid industrializing is often cited as a model for other nations. However, the country is experiencing increasing income inequality and polarization, coupled with a shrinking middle class. Economists believe that rising inequality is a result of three factors: wage gaps between regular and part-timeworkers; gender inequality; and a rapidly aging population, which over time will lead to fewer working-aged individuals with the skills to meet market demands and will thus impact productivity.
Another major problem is the dominance of large business conglomerates, known in Korea as chaebols, which make it very hard for small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) to bring ideas to market. Experts agree that SMEs tend to have low productivity and quickly become technologically outdated, both of which contribute to the salary gap between them and the large conglomerates.
The way government officials and policymakers address these issues will determine how the country fares economically in the medium-to-longterm. To retain its competitive edge, Korea will need to create new growth industries and diversify its economy, including through high-value innovation.
One of the countries with which Korea can deepen its ties to explore ideas that promote innovation is Israel, with which it has much in common. Both are relatively young countries (established within a few months of each other), born out of war and living under constant military threat. Korea and Israel have both become regional economic superpowers, though they have few natural resources other than brain power. There is a tremendous amount that these two democracies can do to leverage their relationship for the greater benefit of their societies.
Both countries have strengths and weaknesses, which seem to complement the other. Israel is strong at creating highly innovative core technologies, while Koreans know how to take core technologies and turn them into commercially viable products. Korean conglomerates have traditionally engaged in low-to-medium-
Israeli innovations today are collectively changing the lives of billions of people around the world by feeding the hungry, curing the sick, protecting the defenseless and making the desert bloom. And Israeli technology is also improving the lives of Koreans every day. To cite just a few examples, Waze is not only popular in the Republic after its launch of a “Korean” voicelast year, but also is the world’s most popular app for navigating traffic and reducing gas consumption; drip irrigation helps conserve more water and grow more food throughout the country; a GPS for brain surgeons guides them as they carry out deep brain stimulation procedures for disorders like Parkinson’s is on the rise;and the use of the PillCam, an ingestible camera that can travel through the intestines to take pictures of your insides, is increasingin Korea, and has changed the way doctors screen, diagnose and treat internal diseases.
What has led so many Israelis to change the world with these incredible innovations? Israel’s success stems from a number of factors, including a culture that encourages questioning and challenging authority. The country embraces its ethnic, political and religious diversity and strongly values secular institutions. Other factors, such as chutzpah, obligatory military service, renowned universities, smart big government and a dearth of natural resources come together as national characteristics to explain how tiny Israel became a technological powerhouse.
These factors are combined with a 3,000-year-old religious tradition that has been calling on us all to do our part to repair the world, including feeding the hungry, curing the sick and helping those in need. This concept of tikkun olamhas helped to shape the pursuit of a greater purpose in Jewish culture.
As the world faces many grave challenges, including some threatening the very future of our planet and humanity, Israel and Korea have the opportunity to work together to find creative solutions that make an impact. Together, these two countries should combine their efforts to leverage technology to address humanity’s largest challenges.
Avi Jorisch is the author of Thou Shalt Innovate: How Israeli Ingenuity Repairs the World (Gefen Publishing). He is also a Senior Fellow at the American Foreign Policy Council and the Israel Project.
4) High-Tech Power-Couple: Israel & South Korea
By Avi Jorisch
South Korea is consistently ranked as one of the most innovative countries, and the fuel that has powered this astonishing metamorphosis is technology. But there are also a number of challenges looming over the horizon that will hamper South Korea’s growth if not effectively addressed. As Korean policymakers, aid workers and scientists look to solve challenges, they should turn to Israel to find existing innovations that can make a difference, or create new ones together.
Since the Republic of Korea declared independence in August 1948, it has transformed its economy from one of the world’s poorest to one of the richest. Last week, Reuters issuedits annual ranking of the world’s most innovative universities, the ones doing the most to advance science, invent new technologies and power new markets. Not surprisingly, Korea had eight of the top 100 universities.
Korea’s development and rapid industrializing is often cited as a model for other nations. However, the country is experiencing increasing income inequality and polarization, coupled with a shrinking middle class. Economists believe that rising inequality is a result of three factors: wage gaps between regular and part-timeworkers; gender inequality; and a rapidly aging population, which over time will lead to fewer working-aged individuals with the skills to meet market demands and will thus impact productivity.
Another major problem is the dominance of large business conglomerates, known in Korea as chaebols, which make it very hard for small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) to bring ideas to market. Experts agree that SMEs tend to have low productivity and quickly become technologically outdated, both of which contribute to the salary gap between them and the large conglomerates.
The way government officials and policymakers address these issues will determine how the country fares economically in the medium-to-longterm. To retain its competitive edge, Korea will need to create new growth industries and diversify its economy, including through high-value innovation.
One of the countries with which Korea can deepen its ties to explore ideas that promote innovation is Israel, with which it has much in common. Both are relatively young countries (established within a few months of each other), born out of war and living under constant military threat. Korea and Israel have both become regional economic superpowers, though they have few natural resources other than brain power. There is a tremendous amount that these two democracies can do to leverage their relationship for the greater benefit of their societies.
Both countries have strengths and weaknesses, which seem to complement the other. Israel is strong at creating highly innovative core technologies, while Koreans know how to take core technologies and turn them into commercially viable products. Korean conglomerates have traditionally engaged in low-to-medium-
Israeli innovations today are collectively changing the lives of billions of people around the world by feeding the hungry, curing the sick, protecting the defenseless and making the desert bloom. And Israeli technology is also improving the lives of Koreans every day. To cite just a few examples, Waze is not only popular in the Republic after its launch of a “Korean” voicelast year, but also is the world’s most popular app for navigating traffic and reducing gas consumption; drip irrigation helps conserve more water and grow more food throughout the country; a GPS for brain surgeons guides them as they carry out deep brain stimulation procedures for disorders like Parkinson’s is on the rise;and the use of the PillCam, an ingestible camera that can travel through the intestines to take pictures of your insides, is increasingin Korea, and has changed the way doctors screen, diagnose and treat internal diseases.
What has led so many Israelis to change the world with these incredible innovations? Israel’s success stems from a number of factors, including a culture that encourages questioning and challenging authority. The country embraces its ethnic, political and religious diversity and strongly values secular institutions. Other factors, such as chutzpah, obligatory military service, renowned universities, smart big government and a dearth of natural resources come together as national characteristics to explain how tiny Israel became a technological powerhouse.
These factors are combined with a 3,000-year-old religious tradition that has been calling on us all to do our part to repair the world, including feeding the hungry, curing the sick and helping those in need. This concept of tikkun olamhas helped to shape the pursuit of a greater purpose in Jewish culture.
As the world faces many grave challenges, including some threatening the very future of our planet and humanity, Israel and Korea have the opportunity to work together to find creative solutions that make an impact. Together, these two countries should combine their efforts to leverage technology to address humanity’s largest challenges.
Avi Jorisch is the author of Thou Shalt Innovate: How Israeli Ingenuity Repairs the World (Gefen Publishing). He is also a Senior Fellow at the American Foreign Policy Council and the Israel Project.
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5) The world leadership of Keren Hayesod UIA is pleased to announce that following consultations with Prime Minister Netanyahu and subject to the official approval by the World Zionist Organization that is expected in the next few weeks - Mr. Sam Grundwerg will be the next World Chairman of the Keren Hayesod.
SAM GRUNDWERG was appointed Consul General of Israel in Los Angeles by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in 2016, and in that capacity was the senior representative of the State of Israel to the Southwestern United States.
Immediately before becoming Consul General, Mr. Grundwerg served as Director General in Israel for the World Jewish Congress (WJC), an international organization representing Jewish communities in over 100 countries to governments, parliaments and other international organizations. As the head of WJC's operations in Israel, Mr. Grundwerg advanced the overall mission of the WJC to strengthen and support Jewish communities around the world, as well as the State of Israel and the Jewish People.
Before joining the World Jewish Congress Mr. Grundwerg worked as an attorney at a major international law firm in the United States and held positions in the fields of law and finance in the U.S. and Israel. He earned his Juris Doctor degree from the University of Miami School of Law and holds an M.B.A. in finance from the University of Miami School of Business, as well as an undergraduate degree from Bar Ilan University.
Originally hailing from Miami Beach, Florida, Grundwerg fulfilled a lifelong dream and moved to Israel in 1990 and made Aliyah soon afterward. Once in Israel, he served as a combat soldier in the IDF armored corps, and later in the IDF reserves as a casualty officer.
Mr. Grundwerg is married to Julia, a nurse. The couple has three children, Elisha, Felicia and Sarita.
Chairman of the Keren Hayesod UIA World Board of Trustees, Mr. David Koschitzky, said: “We are very happy to have Mr. Grundwerg, with his impressive record of work in the Jewish world and in representing Israel, join the world family of Keren Hayesod, and I wish him the best of success in this important role.”
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