What’s at stake in the midterm elections
Hello from London.
This has been a week of political comebacks at both ends of the spectrum. On the right, Binyamin Netanyahu, Israel’s longest-serving prime minister, is set to return to office, after the array of right-wing parties backing him won a majority in the Knesset in Tuesday’s election. Mr Netanyahu owes his victory to a remarkable surge for the far-right Religious Zionism list, which is co-led by Itamar Ben-Gvir. The firebrand Mr Ben-Gvir has called for the expulsion from Israel of “disloyal” Arab citizens. The Religious Zionists’ advance makes the creation of a Palestinian state ever more remote and may make it harder to build on the Abraham accords with Arab countries.
On the left, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, who was first elected president of Brazil 20 years ago, just held off Jair Bolsonaro, the right-wing incumbent, in last Sunday’s run-off. Mr Bolsonaro, who’d suggested he might not accept defeat, didn’t explicitly concede, but his chief of staff promised co-operation in the transfer of power. For Lula, who only three years ago was released from prison (his conviction for corruption was later quashed), winning was the easy part. He will preside over a bitterly divided country—and Mr Bolsonaro’s party will be the biggest in Congress.
Brazilian elections matter more than most to climate change, our cover topic last week. Under Mr Bolsonaro, deforestation of the Amazon rainforest sped up; Lula has promised to curb it. Yesterday COP27, the UN’s annual climate summit, began in Egypt. Alas, there is no longer any chance of holding global temperatures to 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels, the ambitious target world leaders agreed on in Paris in 2015. As Edward McBride writes in a special report, adaptation to a changing climate is now urgent. The good news is that it’s feasible; the bad is that it’s woefully underfunded.
In the week ahead, as well as keeping an eye on COP27, we’ll be focusing on America’s midterms. The Republican Party is highly likely to recapture the House of Representatives and (our election model suggests) has a better than even chance of taking the Senate too. You may wonder why the Democrats aren’t doing better, given the extremism of some Republican candidates. If so (or even if not) I recommend this week’s Lexington column. The economy isn’t helping. President Biden’s loose fiscal policy has exacerbated inflation. The Federal Reserve is striving to rein it in, having raised interest rates again last Wednesday.
Over the weekend we published our assessment of the key congressional races as they enter the final straight and looked at the contests for state office, from governorships on down. Of course we’ll be reporting on the results once they’re in—and telling you what we make of them.
The war in Ukraine, too, will continue to demand our attention. There was a small piece of good news this week, in that Russia reversed its decision to withdraw from an agreement to allow grain—desperately needed in some poor countries—to be exported from Ukrainian ports. Why small? Because the deal is due to expire this month and is far from sure to be renewed, and because Vladimir Putin is not the only armed thug worsening global hunger. This weekend we published a piece from on the ground in Ukraine covering the Western weapons helping defend Ukrainian skies, as Russia turns to Iran for rockets and drones.?
Having started by mentioning political comebacks, I’ll leave you with a journalistic one to look forward to. Adam Roberts, who’s been enjoying a well-earned break, will be writing to you again next weekend. Please continue to share thoughts or suggestions with us at [email protected] in the meantime.
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Economist reads:?
Spain is visited by millions of English-speaking tourists every year, drawn by sun, sand, sangría and in some cases culture. Yet the modern country is oddly little-known. Outsiders’ views of it are often fixed by the writing of George Orwell and Ernest Hemingway about the civil war of 1936-39, which was not only part of a global struggle against fascism but also an especially bloody episode in a century-long domestic battle between conservatives and modernisers. The victor, Francisco Franco, ruled as a dictator until his death in 1975. Since then Spain has changed with extraordinary speed, becoming in many ways a “normal” western European democracy with a tolerant, free-wheeling society. That tolerance and the country’s political system have been tested over the past decade in several ways, including by an economic slump from 2008 to 2013 and by the rise of separatism in Catalonia. Both are proving resilient. This selection of books and films includes some gripping works on the country’s history as well as explorations of the present democratic period from different vantage points.
Our latest column on workplace culture:
The Mopei phone-swing device is ingeniously depressing. It is a cradle for smartphones that rocks back and forth when it is plugged in, and it is designed to cheat fitness apps into believing that you are on the move. If you have a step counter, this phone shaker can gull it into thinking you have taken 8,700 paces in an hour. “Ideal for those people who don’t have the time or energy to get your recommended steps in,” boasts the product blurb.
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VTI Inc. - Creative Content Development - Motion Picture
2 年A foolish opinion believed by millions remains a foolish opinion. The shallowness at the top reflects what is evolving as a money first and life last issue. The collective mirror image at the UN struggling with its message it the environmental economy produces no instantaneous gratification the pleasures of finance bring in the world peopled by I their wont to be top dog in their circle. There's a lot of political barking going on but alas the Russians are proving old world bullet bullying settles imaginative real scores whether we like it or not. We still can't figure out why the political dogs bark in the middle of the night wishing to wake everyone to their perceived alarm which we find out was real even though we slept through it. Who and where are the leaders? Does anyone know? Evaluating all the collective political barking going on no one seems to know, even though most pretend to know. You are only as good as your audience. Presently its political fashionista statement reflects desperation of its somebody else's problem I'm fine. The question is are we on a Space X journey, or naively listening to the violins on the Titanic?
The relationship between the economic crisis and regime change in major countries, we have already experienced a global economic crisis with the regime-based policies of Britain's new prime minister, Tross, and the Brazilian regime, which is weaker than that, has been replaced by a massive development of Amazon's jungle. If Republicans dominate again starting with the U.S. midterm elections, this time, new issues at the Trump level could be improved. 2023 will be more important than ever when it comes to the global economy and the global environmental risks..
Writer/ Editor (Spanish) Jewelry designer
2 年“enjoy” is not the right word, but it’s a good read!
Government Relations & Public Policy @Paytm | LSR | TISS
2 年very insightful!