Friday, July 23, 2021

Shedding light on the dark side of firm lobbying

News from the Journal of Marketing

AMERICAN MARKETING ASSOCIATION

Researchers from George Mason University, University of Manitoba, Colorado State University, and Georgetown University published a new paper in the Journal of Marketing that examines an unintended customer consequence of lobbying, decreased customer satisfaction, and also explains marketing-focused efforts that can help prevent it.

The study, forthcoming in the the Journal of Marketing, is titled "Shedding Light on the Dark Side of Firm Lobbying: A Customer Perspective" and is authored by Gautham Vadakkepatt, Sandeep Arora, Kelly Martin, and Neeru Paharia.

Lobbying, or attempts to sway government officials to make decisions beneficial to the lobbying firm, is an important means for businesses to manage their regulatory environment. Lobbying spending has increased by more than 130% since 1998 (Center for Responsive Politics) and many large firms maintain their own government affairs divisions, which retain dozens of lobbyists.

This new study reveals a dark side to lobbying. The research findings emphasize to managers that it is important to consider customer effects (e.g., potential loss of customer focus and reduction in customer satisfaction) of firm lobbying. These effects are surprising given that previous research has shown lobbying to have positive accounting and financial market returns, with some evidence that lobbying returns can be even higher than returns to investment in activities such as R&D. Investors view lobbying as favorable toward market value projections and it can signal critical firm influence when policies that affect them are being debated. Vadakkepatt explains, though, that "These assessments of lobbying's benefits have been conducted absent consideration of the firm's customers. Our findings show this is a significant oversight."

In an investigation of the lobbying effects on customer outcomes, the research team finds that increased lobbying spending leads to decreased customer satisfaction, which in turn reduces the effect of lobbying on firm value. Yet, it is unclear if customers are aware of a firm's specific lobbying efforts. Because of this, as Arora says, "Our team took a close look at what is happening inside the firm that causes increased lobbying spending to reduce customer satisfaction. Our research shows that lobbying leads to a loss of customer focus. That loss of customer focus can reduce customer satisfaction. This is an important finding for firms because it reveals an unintended customer consequence of lobbying."

The study's longitudinal analysis of firms shows that when accounting for customer satisfaction loss, the benefits firms otherwise receive from lobbying can be reduced. So, what, if anything, can firms do to prevent or minimize such losses? Several marketing-focused moderators can shift firm attention back to customers and reduce customer satisfaction losses from lobbying. First, firms with a marketing CEO suffer less customer satisfaction loss from lobbying. A CEO with a marketing background (as opposed to a CEO with some other functional area expertise) understands the need to monitor customer expectations and create customer value and thereby can align firm lobbying efforts with customer priorities. Firm spending on marketing-focused activities such as R&D and advertising also helps reduce customer focus loss. And finally, when firms lobby specifically for product market issues, they experienced reduced customer satisfaction loss. "These mitigating forces reveal that if firms choose to engage in lobbying, those efforts should be either aligned with customer-focused activities or counterbalanced by customer-focused resource allocations," says Martin.

There are public policy implications from these results as well. Paharia says that "Public sentiment suggests a growing distaste for lobbying and close ties between business and government. Our findings suggest that greater limits may be warranted in some areas to promote positive customer outcomes. Although counterintuitive, greater lobbying limits may work to benefit firms by redirecting focus to customers and by improving the quality of the firm's long-term customer outcomes."

Regardless of whether greater limits on lobbying are imposed, the study supports the need for continued disclosure mandates. Due to the Lobbying Disclosure Act, customers, special interest groups, advocates, and researchers can better understand the role of lobbying in modern business practice. Although this reporting necessarily creates a burden for firm compliance, it may have the unexpected benefit of showcasing when firms lobby for product market issues s, which can reduce otherwise negative effects on customer satisfaction.

In summary, lobbying is a source of firm spending that can have a negative connotation, even though finance and economics fields have long demonstrated the positive effects of lobbying for firm performance. This investigation sheds light on a critical dark side and reveals that the firm's focus on customers may be diminished when it also lobbies. Firm focus can be reoriented to customers, but doing so requires intentional, marketing-focused efforts.

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Full article and author contact information available at: https://doi.org/10.1177/00222429211023040

About the Journal of Marketing

The Journal of Marketing develops and disseminates knowledge about real-world marketing questions useful to scholars, educators, managers, policy makers, consumers, and other societal stakeholders around the world. Published by the American Marketing Association since its founding in 1936, JM has played a significant role in shaping the content and boundaries of the marketing discipline. Christine Moorman (T. Austin Finch, Sr. Professor of Business Administration at the Fuqua School of Business, Duke University) serves as the current Editor in Chief.

https://www.ama.org/jm

About the American Marketing Association (AMA)

As the largest chapter-based marketing association in the world, the AMA is trusted by marketing and sales professionals to help them discover what is coming next in the industry. The AMA has a community of local chapters in more than 70 cities and 350 college campuses throughout North America. The AMA is home to award-winning content, PCM® professional certification, premiere academic journals, and industry-leading training events and conferences.

https://www.ama.org

Southeastern US herbaria digitize three million specimens, now freely available online

BOTANICAL SOCIETY OF AMERICA

Research News

IMAGE: SCIENTISTS CAN USE DNA PRESERVED IN HERBARIUM SPECIMENS, LIKE THIS RED TRILLIUM (*TRILLIUM ERECTUM*) COLLECTED ALMOST 100 YEARS AGO IN TENNESSEE, TO UNRAVEL THE GENETIC STRUCTURE OF POPULATIONS LONG SINCE... view more
CREDIT: PHOTO COURTESY OF THE UNIVERSITY OF TENNESSEE AT CHATTANOOGA HERBARIUM

A network of over 100 herbaria spread out across the southeastern United States recently completed the herculean task of fully digitizing more than three million specimens collected by botanists and naturalists over a span of 200 years. The project, which was funded by the National Science Foundation, is part of a larger, ongoing effort by natural history institutions worldwide to make their biological collections easily accessible to researchers studying broad patterns of evolution, extinction, range shifts, and climate change.

In a new study published in the journal Applications in Plant Sciences, researchers involved in the project analyzed the rate at which specimens could be reliably photographed, digitized, and databased to assess how much similar efforts might cost in the future.

"Everybody who was interested in this recognized very early on just how much labor and money we were talking about," said senior author Joey Shaw, associate professor of biology and herbarium curator at the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga.

Although digitization efforts had been underway at large institutions since the turn of the century, to date, no one had developed a robust framework for determining how much it cost to bring a set of collections online, noted Shaw.

"No one had really been doing it at any sort of scale to understand how many specimens you could catalog per minute."

Such information can be vitally important for smaller institutions that rely on a dwindling fraction of administrative funding to maintain their collections. At universities and liberal arts colleges, these efforts are also heavily reliant on students, who perform the work for college research credit or as student employees, which comes with its own associated set of benefits and pitfalls.

Digitizing specimens is often the first direct experience students have with natural history, and, for many, it blossoms into a lifelong appreciation for biology. For some, as was the case for four authors on the study, this appreciation later culminates in graduate studies and careers in the natural sciences.

Student employment, however, is by nature transient, and resources invested in training students is often duplicated when they graduate or move on to other projects. So, at the outset of the project's conception, Shaw and his colleagues wanted to integrate into their analyses the lag associated with student training along with the subsequent increase in productivity as students gained experience.

The resulting estimates were incredibly precise, to the extent that Shaw and his colleagues could pinpoint exactly when classes let out by analyzing the rates at which specimen photographs were uploaded.

"The students ended up being so efficient that the computer and internet speed actually starting slowing down the process when classes let out, when there's a surge of people picking up their phones," Shaw said.

With hundreds of thousands of specimens now freely accessible online, Shaw hopes that their data will help inform workers at other herbaria hoping to replicate their results. All of the partnering institutions in this study are members of the SouthEast Regional Network of Expertise and Collections (SERNEC), which supports more than 200 herbaria in the region that house a combined 15 million specimens, the majority of which have yet to be digitized.

With increasing amounts of habitat loss due to urbanization and deforestation, herbaria offer researchers a valuable window into ecosystems long-since developed or demolished. Many collections include specimens that are now extinct in the wild, while others have yielded the discovery of entirely new species. And as average global temperatures continue to rise, scientists are increasingly turning to herbaria collection data to analyze the effects climate change has already had on plant communities.

"Biologists have accumulated species data from all over the world, in the form of biological specimens, since at least the Renaissance, and we continue this practice today," Shaw said. "Our recent work has been to convert the data of these biological specimens into a freely accessible online database. It will be the largest dataset assembled on Earth's biodiversity, and we are only at the beginning of dreaming up research, conservation, and land management questions that will be answered with this database."

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Citation: Powell, C., A. Krakowiak, R. Fuller, E. Rylander, E. Gillespie, S. Krosnick, B. Ruhfel, et al. 2021. Estimating herbarium specimen digitization rates: Accounting for human experience. Applications in Plant Sciences 9(4): e11410. https://doi.org/10.1002/aps3.11410

Applications in Plant Sciences (APPS) is a monthly, peer-reviewed, open access journal focusing on new tools, technologies, and protocols in all areas of the plant sciences. It is published by the Botanical Society of America (http://www.botany.org), a nonprofit membership society with a mission to promote botany, the field of basic science dealing with the study and inquiry into the form, function, development, diversity, reproduction, evolution, and uses of plants and their interactions within the biosphere. APPS is available as part of the Wiley Online Library (https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/journal/21680450).

For further information, please contact the APPS staff at apps@botany.org.

Thursday, July 22, 2021

Thieves in California are stealing scarce water amid extreme drought, 'devastating' some communities

As an extreme drought grips California, making water increasingly scarce, thieves are making off with billions of gallons of the precious resource, tapping into fire hydrants, rivers, and even small family homes and farms

By Brisa Colon, CNN 4 hrs ago

© Justin Sullivan/Getty Images In an aerial view, low water levels are visible at Lake Oroville on July 22, 2021, in Oroville, California. As the extreme drought emergency continues in California, thieves are making off with billions of gallons of water, tapping into fire hydrants, rivers, and even small family homes and farms.

State and local officials say water theft is a long running-issue, but the intensifying drought has driven the thefts to record levels as reservoirs dry up and bandits make off with stolen water, often to cultivate the growth of illegal marijuana crops.

"Water stealing has never been more severe," said John Nores, head of the California Department of Fish and Wildlife Marijuana Enforcement Team. The agency has been fighting the thefts for years, usually in rural areas of the parched state, that have been "devastating" communities, he said.

More than 12 billion gallons of water are estimated to have been stolen across the state since 2013, impacting legitimate farming operations, drinking water sources, Native American tribes and small communities, Nores said.

How thieves are getting their hands on water

Officials say the thieves are getting their hands on water by breaking into secure water stations, drilling into water lines, tapping into fire hydrants and using violence and threats against farmers, making off with truckloads of water for their crops under cover of darkness.

The issue has become so severe that some communities have been forced to place locks on fire hydrants or remove them altogether.

"The amount of water that is being stolen to water those (marijuana) plants has a huge impact on our local aquifers," Siskiyou County Sheriff Jeremiah LaRue told CNN. His rural county in the northernmost part of the state is one of the hardest hit by thieves, where many residents rely on well water.

Yvonne West, director of the State Water Resources Control Board's Office of Enforcement, told CNN that the board has recently received an "uptick in complaints" of stolen water. It is a "local problem" in smaller communities, West said.

In Southern California, about 300 residents in the Antelope Valley saw their water system crash last year after thieves used water trucks to tap fire hydrants and water mains illegally. Water pressure in the area north of Los Angeles dropped so low at one point, it caused "the system to fail," said Anish Saraiya, public works deputy for Los Angeles County Supervisor Kathryn Barger.

The county has seen up to 18 water main breaks, forcing the waterworks department to spend about a half-million dollars responding to the incidents, Saraiya said.

"It's a growing problem," Saraiya told CNN.

Theft happening as California enters its hottest stretch

As California enters its hottest and driest stretch of the year, which forces municipalities to increasingly restrict water use, the thefts are threatening to make a bad situation even more dire.

"As the state enters another potential drought emergency, we need to ensure that this new activity does not further exacerbate water scarcity," Barger said in a statement to CNN.

Officials say they are doing all they can to combat the issue by removing fire hydrants, securing key water sources and implementing greater enforcement to stop would-be thieves from making off with water.

The California Department of Fish and Wildlife MET team has made more than 900 felony arrests of illegal cannabis growers and removed over 400 miles of pipes diverting water from natural streams to man-made dams, Nores said. Those diversions threaten native fish and wildlife that depend on the water to survive during hot summer months.

As officials move to crack down on the thieves, the drought -- which now covers every corner of the state -- threatens to create long-term impacts as climate change exacerbates the hot and dry conditions, creating a vicious feedback loop that becomes harder to break.

"All of California has to get used to this concept of water scarcity," West said.

INDIGENOUS CAPITALI$M IS STILL CAPITALI$M

Two Alberta First Nations want court to allow appeal of decision on coal mine

A second Alberta First Nation wants a court to allow it to appeal a review board's decision that an open-pit coal mine in the Rocky Mountains is not in the public interest.

© Provided by The Canadian Press

The Stoney Nakoda Nation has filed a request with the Alberta Court of Appeal to appeal the decision that blocks the development of Benga Mining's proposed Grassy Mountain project near the town of Crowsnest Pass in southwestern Alberta.

"The (panel) did not properly assess the impact that rejecting the project would have on Stoney Nakoda Aboriginal and treaty rights and economic interests related to the accommodation of those rights," says the Stoney application.

The Piikani First Nation filed a similar request last week, as did Benga Mining.

Two other southern Alberta First Nations, the Kainai and the Siksika, are not filing appeals.

"Kainai will not participate in Benga's appeal," said a statement from the band.

"Kainai remains concerned about coal projects in the Crowsnest Pass region, and in particular on the headwaters of the Oldman River watershed, and will continue to oppose any other efforts to pursue coal mines in the region."

The Siksika council made a similar statement.

"As the government of Alberta has not addressed Siksika’s concerns about coal projects in the Crowsnest Pass region, Siksika will continue to oppose any other efforts to pursue coal mines," it said.

In June, a joint federal-provincial environmental review panel decided the project should not proceed because the threat it posed to southern Alberta's water supply was too great for the economic benefits it would have created.

The mine, the company said, would create about 500 jobs during two years of construction and 400 more over its 23-year life. The company said it would pay $1.7 billion in royalties and $35 million in municipal taxes over that time.

But the panel concluded the mine posed too great an environmental risk to the headwaters of the Oldman River from selenium, an element commonly found in coal mines that, in large doses, is toxic to fish.

The panel cast doubt on Benga's promises to capture up to 98 per cent of selenium released. It said Benga's assumptions were overly optimistic, its reclamation plans vague and its economic projections overstated.

The review panel also concluded the mine would damage ecosystems and impair the cultural and physical heritage of local First Nations.

But the Stoney Nakoda Nation, which has signed an impact and benefits agreement with Benga, said it was never asked.

The Piikani said that the panel relied on a ruling from an Alberta government office that said consultation had been adequate. As a result, it didn't dig deeply enough into how blocking the mine would affect the First Nation.

Piikani Chief Stanley Grier said the review panel shouldn't have relied solely on the provincial office to get the band's perspective.

"We were never consulted by the joint review panel directly," he said. "Nobody speaks on behalf of the Piikani Nation but ourselves."

He acknowledged some Piikani members oppose the mine, but said chief and council held extensive meetings with band members and elders before making its decision.

"I respect them, but that does not change the chief and council's decision."

He said the panel's reliance on the provincial office to ensure the Piikani were consulted was disrespectful not only to his nation, but other First Nations as well.

Grier called the 25-year projected life of the mine a generational opportunity for his people that could now be lost.

"That is a legacy opportunity for us."

Latasha Calf Robe of the Niitsitapi Water Protectors — a group opposing coal development — said concern about the projects among the membership of all First Nations in the region is growing.

"I would say we're pushing toward 70 per cent," she said.

Benga said the panel treated it unfairly by telling the company it had filed a complete application with supporting documents, then concluding its environmental information was inadequate.

It also said the panel ignored relevant environmental data while accepting evidence the company calls "non-expert and unfounded opinion."

The Piikani and Benga applications are to be heard Sept. 9, while the Stoney appeal is to be heard on Sept. 22.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published July 22, 2021.

— Follow Bob Weber on Twitter at @row1960

Bob Weber, The Canadian Press

Former UN human rights chief to head probe of alleged crimes in Israel-Hamas conflict

BY CAROLINE VAKIL - 07/22/21

© Getty Images

The U.N. Human Rights Council on Thursday announced that former UN Rights chief Navi Pillay will chair a three-person commission investigating “alleged violations and abuses” in Israel and Israeli-occupied territory.

According to The Associated Press, the commission was set up following the latest conflict in May between the militant group Hamas and Israel, which lasted 11 days. Reuters reported that at least 13 Israelis and 250 Palestinians were killed during the conflict.

Pillay, who was a former judge on the South African High Court, was the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights from 2008 to 2014.

The additional members on the commission include Miloon Kothari, a former UN Special Rapporteur on adequate housing, and Chris Sidoti, founder and an international expert of the Special Advisory Council for Myanmar.

According to a joint resolution that the UN rights body adopted in May, the commission will investigate “all alleged violations of international humanitarian law and all alleged violations and abuses of international human rights law leading up to and since 13 April 2021.”

Additionally, the resolution says that the commission will be set up to investigate “all underlying root causes of recurrent tensions, instability and protraction of conflict, including systematic discrimination and repression based on national, ethnic, racial or religious identity.”

A report will be submitted by commission to the council in June of next year, followed by one every year, AP noted.

According to Reuters, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, has said that the Israeli strikes that proved deadly in Gaza may be considered war crimes. Additionally, she said that international humanitarian law have been violated by Hamas after rockets were fired into Israel.

Israel has been critical of the commission and claims that the Human Rights Council is biased against Israel, AP noted.

MONEY FOR NOTHING
Senate panel adds $25B to Biden's defense budget

BY REBECCA KHEEL - 07/22/21

© Getty Images

The Senate Armed Services Committee has approved a $778 billion defense policy bill, adding nearly $25 billion more to the defense budget than the Biden administration requested.

The funding boost would go entirely to the Pentagon, giving the department $740.3 billion compared to the Biden administration’s request for $715 billion.

The remainder of the budget goes to non-Pentagon defense programs, such as the Energy Department’s nuclear weapons programs.

The increase was approved as a Republican-proposed amendment to the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) that received bipartisan support when the committee met behind closed doors to consider the bill Wednesday night.

“I’m proud the bipartisan Senate Armed Services Committee could come together to put service members first and support my amendment to sufficiently increase defense spending in the National Defense Authorization Act,” committee ranking member Sen. Jim Inhofe (R-Okla.) said in a statement Thursday. “While no bill has everything I want, I am proud to support this bill because it provides the appropriate increase in funding our needs.”

Overall, the NDAA cleared the Senate Armed Services Committee in a 23-3 vote, the panel said Thursday.

Republicans had been complaining for months that President Biden’s defense budget request was inadequate in the face of threats from China and Russia.

Biden’s $753 billion defense budget represented a slight bump from the Trump administration’s last defense budget of $740 billion.

But Republicans argued that when accounting for inflation, the proposal would actually be a cut compared to last year. Instead, they have been pushing for a 3 to 5 percent increase above inflation.

With the Senate Armed Services Committee evenly split between the parties, Republicans needed just one Democrat to side with them to approve the funding boost.

And with the Senate split 50-50, Democrats are also likely to need Republicans to pass the defense bill, which progressives routinely oppose.

The NDAA is a policy bill, not a spending bill, meaning even if the final product has a topline of $778 billion, a separate appropriations bill with a matching dollar figure would also have to pass for the increase to become a reality.

Still, the Senate Armed Services Committee’s move complicates congressional talks over the defense budget and is sure to infuriate progressive Democrats, who have been pushing for a 10 percent cut to the defense budget.

The House Appropriations Committee earlier this month advanced a Pentagon spending bill that matches Biden’s request.

House Armed Services Committee Chairman Adam Smith (D-Wash.) has similarly said he thinks Biden’s budget request is sufficient.

“No matter how large the budget, there's always this list of unfunded requirements,” Smith said at a hearing last month. “And it strikes me as simply a forcing mechanism to, no matter what, force more money into the system.”

SEE

LA REVUE GAUCHE - Left Comment: Search results for PERMANENT ARMS ECONOMY

LA REVUE GAUCHE - Left Comment: Military Industrial Complex

Biden administration stokes frustration over Canada

BY REID WILSON - 07/22/21

The Biden administration’s decision to extend border restrictions between the United States and Canada is stoking frustration among members of Congress who represent states and districts that abut the Great White North, including some of the president’s closest allies.

The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) said Wednesday it would extend the closure of land borders between the neighboring allies through at least Aug. 21. Its announcement came two days after the Canadian government said it would admit Americans fully vaccinated against the coronavirus beginning Aug. 9.

The American extension on restrictions came as a surprise to members of Congress who had been pushing to ease the lockdown, several sources on Capitol Hill said. They felt caught off guard by an announcement that is all but certain to doom some businesses that will now lose a second straight summer of cross-border economic activity.

“I’m deeply disappointed in the Biden administration’s decision to unilaterally extend the Canada-U.S. border closure another month. This means further suffering in our border communities in Whatcom County & elsewhere,” Rep. Suzan DelBene (D-Wash.) wrote on Twitter.

Washington Gov. Jay Inslee (D), who has pushed to reopen the border for months — especially to residents of Point Roberts, Wash., an isolated community whose only access to the mainland is by driving through Canada — called himself “extremely disappointed” in the decision.

Rep. Brian Higgins (D-N.Y.), who represents Buffalo and Niagara Falls and who co-chairs the Canada-U.S. Inter-Parliamentary Group, said in a call with reporters that the Biden administration was misleading Americans.

“Today’s decision by the Biden administration harms economic recovery and hurts families all across America’s northern border; this is completely unnecessary,” Higgins said in a statement. “Continuation of this shutdown is illogical given the success of vaccines and counterproductive, putting the United States at a disadvantage given Canada’s decision to welcome back vaccinated Americans effective August 9th.”

Even Senate Majority Leader Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.), one of Biden’s critical allies on Capitol Hill, criticized the administration for “failing to reciprocate” Canada’s reopening gesture.

“It is critical for the United States to level the playing field and create a uniform system, following the science and data, to safely — and finally — reopen the border for those vaccinated,” Schumer said in a statement.

DelBene and several other members of Congress have asked for meetings with the White House to clarify the administration’s position.

The 17-month shutdown of the northern border is the longest in history, outpacing even the shutdown that took place during the War of 1812. And while Canada and the United States ostensibly closed the border in March 2020 through a cooperative agreement, experts said it is becoming increasingly clear that there is little agreement — or even dialogue — a year later.

“For these two great partners who were supposedly operating together in closing the border, they have been operating independently from the beginning,” said Christopher Sands, director of the Wilson Center’s Canada Institute and a professor of Canadian Studies at Johns Hopkins University. “There’s not a lot of what you would call high level planning on how are we going to ease these restrictions.”

The economic devastation wrought by the lockdown is being felt most in tourism-reliant communities on either side of the border. After the lost summer of 2020, those communities hoped that the new influx of vaccines against the coronavirus, and the pandemic’s North American ebb, would bring relief.

After a slow start in administering its own vaccines, Canada has raced ahead of the United States. Today, 52 percent of Canadians are fully vaccinated against the virus, and another 18 percent are partially vaccinated. In the United States, 48 percent are fully vaccinated and another 7.5 percent have had one shot.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau announced the looser border restrictions on Monday. At the same press conference, Bill Blair, Canada’s minister of public safety, said he had been in contact with DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, who told him the U.S. was considering its own data.

Asked about loosening border restrictions, White House press secretary Jen Psaki has said the United States is following its own data-driven metrics, rather than any kind of reciprocal agreement

“We rely on the guidance of our health and medical experts, not on the actions of other countries,” Psaki told reporters Wednesday aboard Air Force One.

Republicans who represent border districts have put their own pressure on the Biden administration. In a letter to the White House last week, 14 Republicans who hold neighboring districts urged the White House to lift remaining restrictions.

“President Biden’s decision to unilaterally extend the Canada-U.S. border closure — despite the clear progress our nation has made and Canada’s easing restrictions — represents a failure to lead our country,” Rep. Dan Newhouse (R-Wash.) told The Hill. “There is simply no scientific reason to keep our nation shuttered away, and the ramifications this closure has on our border communities and small businesses is causing more long-term damage than he seems to realize.”

The American resistance to reopening the border is becoming a political challenge for Trudeau, who has considered calling elections as early as this fall. Trudeau has generally received high marks for his handling of the pandemic, and his Liberal Party leads recent polls, giving him an opportunity to turn his minority government into a majority.

Biden administration sanctioning Cuban officials over response to...
Biden administration moves to withdraw death penalty requests in...

Canadians largely celebrated Biden’s victory over former President Trump in 2020, and Trudeau greeted Biden warmly at the G-7 summit last month in Cornwall, Britain. But with the border closed for another month, the new American president has robbed his Canadian counterpart of a convenient foil.

“The good thing about Trump was that Trump got blamed for everything,” Sands said. With Biden, “people have expected [Trudeau] to be able to do more.”

Egypt unveils military vessel, Greek funerary site in sunken city

The find was made during underwater excavations at Thonis-Heracleion, a one-time bustling metropolis that sat on the edge of the Nile river where it meets with the Mediterranean sea.

The New Arab Staff & Agencies
20 July, 2021

The find was made during underwater excavations at Thonis-Heracleion

[Egyptian Ministry of Antiquities/AFP]

Archaeologists have found rare remains of a military vessel and a Greek funerary complex in an ancient sunken city that once served as Egypt's main Mediterranean port, officials said Monday.

The find was made during underwater excavations at Thonis-Heracleion, a one-time bustling metropolis that sat on the edge of the Nile river where it meets with the Mediterranean sea.

Thonis-Heracleion was for centuries considered Egypt's largest port in the area until Alexander the Great founded the coastal city of Alexandria in 331 BC.

The city, submerged following a series of earthquakes and tidal waves, was discovered in 2001.

"An Egyptian-French mission ... found the debris of a military vessel from the Ptolemaic era and the remains of a Greek funerary complex dating to the fourth century BC," the antiquities ministry said.

Flat-bottomed with large oars, mast, and sails, the 25-metre-long (82-foot-long) vessel was often used for navigation within the Nile Delta, according to preliminary studies.

Archaeologists say the ship which was supposed to dock near Amun Temple in the area sank following the famed ancient temple's collapse in an earthquake in the second century BC.

"Finds of fast ships from this age are extremely rare," according to Franck Goddio of the European Institute for Underwater Archaeology (IEASM) which led the mission.

Underwater archaeologists also found a funerary complex showing the presence of Greek merchants in the area during the late period of ancient Egypt.

The antiquities ministry said Greeks had dominated the region at the time and built funerary temples in the vicinity of Amun Temple.

Remnants of these temples were found "in excellent condition" underwater, it added.

The latest findings testify to "the richness of temples in the city which now lies under Mediterranean sea water", the ministry said.

Between Infodemic and

Pandemic: The Paranoid Style

in Taiwanese Politics

Conspiracy theories are apparently a side effect of the Delta variant in Taiwan

Jul 22, 2021 7:00AM EDT

Brian Hioe @brianhioe

When the news reports started appearing in Taiwanese media about people becoming magnetized after receiving the COVID-19 vaccine, I thought, “So, it’s finally here.”

The lunacy began after one of the nationwide daily press conferences held by the Central Epidemic Command Center (CECC), which coordinates Taiwan’s efforts against COVID-19. Afterward, a report in the Apple Daily about a woman’s breasts becoming magnetic after vaccination concentrated Taiwan’s sensationalist and often sexist media in a nutshell.

Taiwan, a latecomer to the COVID-19 pandemic, is currently at the tail end of its first and only major outbreak of COVID-19 so far. This first wave took place after the new and more infectious variants of COVID-19 arrived on Taiwan’s shores. But with the arrival of the Delta variant, so, too, is Taiwan seeing the arrival of the disinformation, misinformation, and conspiracy theories that have been circulating throughout the rest of the world.

The reports of vaccines leading to magnetism were widely mocked, with social media posts of people having fun sticking spoons, forks, and other utensils to themselves. Some media reports, meanwhile, warned that Taiwan would soon become a nation of Magnetos. (My own theory is that cultivating a nation of Magnetos is the Tsai administration’s secret plan for warding off a Chinese invasion.)

Cartoon in Taiwanese Hokkien making fun of news reports about magnetism in Taiwanese media.

Some of the new wave of disinformation preys on confusion or gullibility in the elderly, e.g. allegations that the Tsai administration is secretly disposing of dead bodies to cover up the number of deaths. Interestingly, these stories mirror baseless claims of China’s concealing its COVID-19 dead, such as false media reports in 2020 that China was secretly cremating dead bodies in Wuhan. Weirdly, the long-circulated conspiracy theories leveled at China made similarly false claims seem more credible in a Taiwanese context.

The daily 2 PM press conferences held by the CECC, in which Minister of Health Chen Shih-chung takes questions from an audience of journalists after providing updates on the COVID-19 situation, frequently prove ridiculous. After the relaxation of measures reopened parks, but not beaches, the minister was asked if this was because parks are “green” and the ocean is “blue”—green and blue signifying the party colors of the DPP and Kuomintang—the ruling party and the opposition, respectively.

Minister of Health and Welfare Chen Shih-chung.

The minister was also asked if writing “AZ” on vaccination cards would result in other countries refusing to accept proof of vaccination from Taiwan, because foreign medical workers might not know that “AZ” stood for AstraZeneca—to my knowledge, there’s no other vaccine abbreviated “AZ”. The agency was also accused, absurdly, of releasing information on the percentage of the population with partial vaccination status in addition to other data, unlike other nations; that one was easily disproved, since most major international outlets have reported such statistics.

Journalists frequently favor sensationalism over clarification when asking questions at the daily press conferences. For example, even though medical capacity has long since stabilized in Taiwan, with tens of thousands of hospital beds available, health officials might be asked, after an uptick of just a few cases, whether Taiwan’s medical system is on the verge of collapse. Others simply ask the same questions they asked the day before, even though this only gets them the same response.

Journalists from pro-China-leaning outlets incessantly demand to know about the makeshift “square hospitals” being set up in Taiwan, similar to those in China. Meanwhile, reports appearing in Chinese state-run media claim that Taiwan is imitating precedents set by China. Some Taiwanese outlets, according to the Financial Times, accept orders directly from China’s Taiwan Affairs Office, so coordination cannot be ruled out.

Ironically, the CECC press conferences were purportedly aimed at preventing the spread of misinformation and disinformation. This goal appears to have backfired to some degree, though there is of course useful and valuable information coming out along with the politicking, the propaganda and sensationalism. It’s somewhat funny watching this charade unfold daily. Clearly, quite a number of media outlets don’t seem to be sending their best and brightest: If it were a Greek drama, probably the journalist gaggle would be the chorus. I sometimes find myself wondering whether some of these representatives of Taiwan’s major media outlets are stupid, or just cynical—more the latter, probably, since ridiculous questions undeniably make for good soundbites.

Graphic released by the Central Epidemic Command Center thanking the public for following measures against COVID-19.

Unfortunately, though, there are consequences to spreading disinformation and misinformation. Vaccination rates dropped after Taiwanese media took to warning against AstraZeneca vaccines, since there were some cases of the elderly dying after having been vaccinated. Government officials announced in vain that over 200 individuals over 70 die in Taiwan every day, vaccinated or not. While vaccination numbers eventually rebounded, certain members of the public are tough to convince, in Taiwan as in the U.S. and elsewhere.

There has been little discussion in Taiwan about unfounded fears like these having spread in other countries; when the experiences of other countries are brought up, the purpose is often to regurgitate, rather than debunk, their conspiracy theories.

The magnetism story is illustrative of this point. The reporter who asked about it in the press conference claimed, without evidence, that Malaysia had also reported magnetism after vaccination. In Taiwan, as elsewhere, misinformation and disinformation frequently relies on vague reports from the “international world” as a basis for validity, taking advantage of a natural lack of knowledge of distant places among viewers or readers. So, too, with technical and scientific criticisms, like the criticism of the CECC for releasing internationally accepted statistics on vaccine dosage.

Yet in Taiwan the natural human tendency to accept outlandish news from abroad is especially exaggerated, with roots in the country’s marginalization. In the absence of acknowledgement by the majority of the world’s countries, and excluded from international organizations, including the United Nations and World Health Organization, Taiwan frequently perceives itself as left behind and inferior to the “international world.” That makes it easy to sell people on the idea that everybody else is doing or not doing something, or has long since realized something, while Taiwan is too isolated and too backward to do the same.

Graphic released by the Central Epidemic Command Center calling on the public not to go outside, featuring “spokesdog” Zongchai.

Because of this long exclusion, Taiwan often sees itself as a born loser, sometimes even in those aspects in which it is more advanced than other nations. Taiwan’s success in fighting off COVID-19 for all of 2020 was a rare reversal of this tendency to feel inferior, instead expressing pride for its achievements in containing the virus, and offering to assist other countries.

But with the current outbreak, the usual narratives around Taiwan quickly resumed. Although Taiwan is to this day one of very few countries to have experienced only a single limited outbreak, there is a lot of moaning in Taiwanese social discourse falsely claiming Taiwan to have had one of the world’s worst responses to COVID-19, pointing to the low vaccination rate (due to insufficient supplies) or the comparatively high death rate among those infected.

The opposition party, the Kuomintang, has wasted no time in alleging that the Tsai administration failed to secure vaccines, and failed far more gravely than other countries, never mind that much of the world is currently struggling to obtain vaccines. The independence-leaning Tsai administration has said that it has experienced interference from the Chinese government in its efforts to purchase vaccines, while the Kuomintang, which is allied with China, has sought to suggest that under their rule Taiwan would not see such interference, with Kuomintang politicians even publicly thanking China for not interfering with successful vaccine purchases were made by Taiwan.

Cartoon fron the Kuomintang attacking the Tsai administration’s COVID-19 response.

Each country has its own particular paranoid style in politics, perhaps, and if so, this would be Taiwan’s. Certainly, the two major parties are existentially opposed to each other, one for unification and the other for independence. This fundamental schism means that the citizens of Taiwan seem to live in two different realities. Since political discourse is highly polarized and media outlets are hyper-partisan, suspicion abounds for reporting from media outlets that do not belong to one’s own camp, creating an ideal environment for twisted, distorted media. This undercurrent, arguably always the central feature of Taiwanese politics, has been nakedly exposed by the COVID-19 pandemic.