*Weak, divided, incompetent... the west is unfit to challenge Xi’s bid for global hegemony.*

*Knife-edge Polish presidential race could slow the march of (right-wing) populism.*

I added "(right-wing)" so we will not forget that populism around 1900 was a movement for reducing inequality.

*Srebrenica 25 years on: how the world lost its appetite to fight war crimes.*

Since Dubya, the US has become responsible for atrocities around the world — and has constantly fought the ICC's efforts to prosecute them. Dubya start this, Obama continued it, and the bully has pushed even harder on it.

*Facebook is out of control. If it were a country it would be North Korea.* One man decides whether to allow it to wreak havoc on any particular target.

People say they need to try to use Facebook to persuade people of something-or-other. But even if something-or-other is a good thing, Facebook is a much bigger bad thing. Because if you think you are using Facebook, really Facebook is using you.

So don't be a zucker! And don't encourage anyone else to be a zucker.

For Facebook to cease to mistreat its useds would require big changes. But ceasing to promote hate, lies and violence (above love, truth and peace) requires only changing the propagation system to reduce the R value that polarizing statements tend to get on Facebook. Censorship, as such, is not necessary.

*Hongkongers face a Kafkaesque reality as censors outlaw the words of protest.*

Some are protesting with blank signs. Some tried the word "Conscience" and were arrested for that. Hong Kongers are deleting their files, wiping out parts of their lives, fearing they will be prosecuted for that.

The one possible good side of this is that the world will see how evil China is. It will be hard for people, in any country, to convince themselves that getting close to China is safe.

China will seek to use overseas Hong Kongers as hostages, hoping that we will tone down our condemnation lest it give China the idea of punishing them. To do that would mean becoming agents of China. We must tell Hong Kongers that they should stay away from our discussions rather than ask us to censor them for China.

People discussing Hong Kong will have to watch out for Chinese agents of disinformation, provocation, or pleading, some of whom may be Hong Kongers who have cracked.

Academics have the duty to refuse to censor their judgment of Chinese tyranny in order to be able to visit Hong Kong or China again.

With all the injustices that the US has done, it is far less evil than China. We have to steer between two facile errors: (1) equating the US with China, and (2) excusing the wrongs of the US because it is not as bad as China.