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2 weeks ago | 
thespectator.com | Freddy Gray |Ed West |Ross Clark |Daniel McCarthy
A “black swan event”, as defined by the risk analyst Nassim Nicholas Taleb in 2007, is a surprise occurrence that has a major impact on the global financial system and is rationalized after the fact as something that ought to have been expected all along. The 9/11 terror attacks are one example, the Covid pandemic another – shocks that rocked the world and made us wonder if freedom works.
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3 weeks ago | 
thespectator.com | Daniel McCarthy |Kate Andrews |Ross Clark |John Carney
The first thing revealed by the high and wide-ranging new tariffs President Trump announced on “Liberation Day” is just how limited other recent American presidents have been in their thinking. Their ambition was to get elected and re-elected, then retire comfortably into a tranquil post-presidency. They would finish their days lending their names to charities and writing their memoirs (or rather, commissioning ghostwriters to fulfill their publishing contracts).
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3 weeks ago | 
thespectator.com | Sam Olsen |Matthew Lynn |Kate Andrews |Ross Clark
Donald Trump is, at least, a man of his word. Before he won the election, Trump said that China had “really taken advantage of our country” and vowed to slap punitive tariffs on imports from the People’s Republic. As we have repeatedly seen, Trump carries through on his threats. “Liberation Day” saw China hit with 54 percent tariffs as payback for what the President deemed unfair policies, the highest rate on any country.
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3 weeks ago | 
thespectator.com | Matthew Lynn |Kate Andrews |Ross Clark |Michael Evans
They would restore manufacturing, force trade barriers to be taken down, and allow new industries to be created. There have been various different explanations for why President Trump’s new tariff regime made sense. And yet when they were finally revealed on Wednesday one point was clear. There was no logic. The tariffs were just weird. The big reveal turned out to be a board that flapped around in the wind outside the White House.
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3 weeks ago | 
thespectator.com | Kate Andrews |Ross Clark |Michael Evans |Ella Dorn
When President Trump held up an easel in the White House Rose Garden illustrating each country’s “tariffs charged to the USA” and the new “USA discounted reciprocal tariffs”, there appeared to be some small print underneath the first column, barely readable. Then printed copies started to circulate the garden.
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3 weeks ago | 
thespectator.com | Matthew Lynn |Kate Andrews |Ross Clark |John Carney
They would restore manufacturing, force trade barriers to be taken down and allow new industries to be created. There have been various different explanations for why President Trump’s new tariff regime made sense. And yet when they were finally revealed on Wednesday one point was clear. There was no logic. The tariffs were just weird. The big reveal turned out to be a board that flapped around in the wind outside the White House.
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3 weeks ago | 
thespectator.com | Kate Andrews |Ross Clark |John Carney |Dave Seminara
When President Trump held up an easel in the White House Rose Garden illustrating each country’s “tariffs charged to the USA” and the new “USA discounted reciprocal tariffs,” there appeared to be some small print underneath the first column, barely readable. Then printed copies started to circulate the garden.
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3 weeks ago | 
thespectator.com | Ella Dorn |Ross Clark |Magdalene Taylor |Ian Williams
Women’s expectations are off. They want men with advanced degrees, but on university campuses, women outnumber their male counterparts. They want men with above-average incomes, but the gender pay gap has been reversed – young women now outearn men. They want men who share their politics, but in almost every western country over the past decade or so, women have slid to the left while men have remained centrist.
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3 weeks ago | 
thespectator.com | Jonathan Miller |Ross Clark |Charles Lipson |Owen Matthews
Voters in Wisconsin and Florida head to the polls today, including one local election that’s set to break spending records for a race of its kind. In Wisconsin, the open race for the state’s Supreme Court takes top billing, as it will determine whether Democrat-backed judges keep their majority. The stakes are high and the spending reflects that; billionaires from both parties have poured tens of millions of dollars into the race.
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3 weeks ago | 
thespectator.com | Jonathan Miller |Ross Clark |Charles Lipson |Owen Matthews
Billionaires and carpetbaggers dominate first elections of Trump’s second termVoters in Wisconsin and Florida head to the polls today, including one local election that’s set to break spending records for a race of its kind. Mischief, mayhem and Washington gossip from The Spectator’s intrepid beat reporter. In Wisconsin, the open race for the state’s Supreme Court takes top billing, as it will determine whether Democrat-backed judges keep their majority.
