(^38) Best columns: Business
“There is a bipartisan movement to engage in one
of the most significant acts of censorship in modern
American history,” said David French. I’m talking
about the “poorly thought-out, poorly understood”
push to revoke Section 230 of the Communica-
tions Decency Act. “If I write a Google review of a
restaurant and claim they served me spoiled food,”
should Google be responsible? Before Section 230
was enacted in 1996, the courts came up with some
“very unsatisfactory answers” to that question. One
court ruled that if a platform limited any comments
it was liable for every comment. Section 230 was de-
signed to give platforms the leeway to police content
that’s “obscene, lewd, lascivious, filthy, excessively
violent, or harassing” while also protecting “our
ability to post our thoughts and arguments.” But
now that freedom is under fire. Republicans want to
deny Section 230 protections to some sites because
they are “enraged by perceived bias in social media
moderation,” while Joe Biden has proposed revok-
ing Section 230 to force platforms like Facebook and
Twitter to better manage “fake news” ahead of 2020.
But “is it Twitter’s fault if I lie about the news?” It’s
up to me to exercise my rights responsibly, and “the
failure of others to respond well to freedom should
not result in the loss of my right to speak.”
Yet again, President Trump is “abusing the powers of
his office to threaten a U.S. ally,” said Paul Krugman.
He’s withholding documents from the public. And his
claimed motivations “don’t pass the laugh test.” No,
this isn’t about Ukraine, but about Trump’s “repeated
threats to impose prohibitive tariffs on imports of
automobiles from Europe.” Normally, tariffs are set
through legislation passed by Congress. “The law,
however, gives the president discretion to impose tem-
porary tariffs” in response to threats to national secu-
rity. Before Trump, such tariffs were applied sparingly.
But he has used national security justifications “with
abandon”—even to launch an “investigation” into
auto imports from Europe and Japan. “Every trade
expert I know considered the notion that German or
Japanese cars constitute a threat to national security
absurd.” Nonetheless, a report by the Commerce
Department concluded “that auto imports do, indeed,
endanger national security.” How? “Well, we don’t
actually know—because the Trump administration
has refused to release the report.” Obviously, this has
nothing to do with national security. Trump seems to
believe, despite the evidence, “that protectionism will
revive American manufacturing.” But the most im-
portant principle that Trump is defending has nothing
at all to do with economics. It’s “L’état, c’est Trump.” Ge
tty
Don’t kill
free speech
on the internet
David French
Time
Our real trade
policy: ‘L’état,
c’est Trump’
Paul Krugman
The New York Times
British Prime Minister Boris Johnson “de-
fied U.S. hawks” this week to let Huawei
build part of the U.K.’s next-generation
phone network, said Gordon Rayner in
The Daily Telegraph (U.K.). The U.S. has
lobbied Europe heavily to ban equipment
from the controversial Chinese telecom
company. But such a ban could delay the
rollout of advanced services by as much as
three years. Ultimately, Johnson concluded
that “the potential risk to national security
posed by the Chinese telecom giant was
outweighed by the estimated £126 billion
($164 billion) boost to the economy” of
having the 5G rollout proceed as planned. Huawei has “made
considerable technological progress” in recent years, said Ina
Fried in Axios.com, and China is exerting its own pressure on Eu-
ropean countries that are wavering. It has threatened, for instance,
“to close off a key market for German auto exports” if Germany
passes on Huawei. “Like it or not,” Siemens CEO Joe Kaeser said
last week, “they are a year or two ahead.”
The U.S. insists that Huawei is dangerous, but even Trump’s own
Cabinet agencies can’t agree on how, said Ana Swanson in The
New York Times. Last week, the Commerce Department with-
drew its proposal to close a loophole allowing some U.S. com-
panies to sell products to Huawei, after “officials in the Defense
Department and other agencies argued that it would actually un-
dermine national security,” pushing Huawei to source chips from
competitors in Korea or Taiwan. The Commerce decision “ap-
pears to be an admission of defeat in the U.S.-China tech war,”
said David Goldman in the Asia Times. Trump’s effort to block
Huawei’s access to U.S. chip technology
backfired: “Taiwanese companies who
for years had begged for Huawei’s busi-
ness are now flooded with orders.” U.S.
firms are petrified that “Chinese compa-
nies will retaliate against export controls
with a price war for high-end chips.”
Still, this is about more than sales for
U.S. chipmakers, said Annie Fixler and
Mikhael Smits in TheHill.com. Remem-
ber, Huawei is a company with “close
political and financial ties and legal
obligations to the Chinese Communist
Party,” and “the combination of CCP ruthlessness and Huawei
technology threatens human rights” and European security. Ban-
ning Huawei and patiently developing their own secure networks
through companies like Nokia, Ericsson, or Samsung could add
$62 billion to Europe’s 5G tab. But it’s either that, or “roll out
5G infrastructure quickly with a baked-in Trojan horse.”
This started as a worry about cybersecurity, but it has “burst into
a much wider conflict” between Washington and Beijing over
whose country will develop the latest technology, said Stu Woo
and Asa Fitch in The Wall Street Journal. The standoff means
we’re headed to a repeat of the “VHS-versus-Betamax era,” with
much higher stakes. “Imagine two countries with completely dif-
ferent sets of hardware and software for the internet, electronic
devices, telecommunications, and even social media and dating
apps.” Unlikely as it may have seemed just a couple of years ago,
“mutual suspicion all but guarantees the march toward a two-
system tech world.”
Telecom: Huawei comes between U.S. and allies
A ban on Huawei would stall Britain’s 5G rollout.
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