‘Not that deep': Left's ‘comical' freak out over Stephen Colbert's show being axed
'The idea that there's going to be some shortage of anti-Trump voices in our mainstream media or on CBS or on Paramount or on any of these platforms is ridiculous,' he told Sky News Australia.
'It is funny; it's been comical to me to see their meltdown and scream censorship and apocalypse over this when it's really not that deep.'
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The Age
6 minutes ago
- The Age
A China shock 2.0 is emerging to rock America
Yet instead of pursuing the policies needed to meet this threat head-on, the MAGA agenda is heavily focused on fighting the last war – on bringing manufacturing jobs lost to China and elsewhere back to the US. The challenge, Autor and Hanson argue, is not that of attempting to resuscitate the industrial might of a bygone age, but ensuring that the US is front and centre of the new technologies and able to convincingly harness them to its own ends. This endeavour is not obviously helped by Trump's scattergun approach to tariffs, punishing friend and foe alike, his propensity to alienate rather than co-operate with allies, the stupefying attacks on scientific research and the repudiation of foreign talent – once the very lifeblood of American advancement. Nor is it helped by the administration's casual disregard for the great asset of dollar hegemony which, bizarrely, Stephen Miran, Trump's chief economic adviser, seems to regard as in some way partly responsible for America's de-industrialisation. An administration seemingly hell-bent on fiscal ruin, and on weakening the dollar for the purposes of making US goods more competitive, doesn't exactly inspire international confidence in the dollar as a reserve currency asset. Loading China, by contrast, is investing heavily in the digital yuan as a way of internationalising its own currency, of offering an alternative to the fool's gold of cryptocurrency and of usurping the dollar for cross-border payments. Already, it is making steady progress. Why any longer should Brazil use the dollar for selling soybeans to China when Trump threatens the country with punitive tariffs for the sin of prosecuting his friend, Jair Bolsonaro, the former Brazilian president? Why indeed should it employ the dollar at all when the US regularly uses its power for extraterritorial purposes? In the developing world, Western influence is waning fast; China has been quick and single-minded at moving into its place. China has many problems and challenges, from the demographic to the still-deflating credit and property bubbles. But its catch-up and overtake approach to the technologies of the future is already paying big dividends. As, too, is the aggressive expansion of China's universities sector, originally begun under Jiang Zemin's presidency in the late 1990s, and heavily focused on Stem (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) subjects. According to the Australian Strategic Policy Institute (ASPI), the US-led China in 60 of 64 frontier technologies as recently as 2007, judged by share of the world's most-cited research, while China led the US in three. However, by 2023, these rankings were reversed, with China leading in 57 of 64 key technologies, and the US in seven. 'China has built the foundations to position itself as the world's leading science and technology superpower, by establishing a sometimes stunning lead in high-impact research across the majority of critical and emerging technology domains,' the ASPI says. All of the world's top 10 research institutions in some technologies are based in China, and are already collectively generating nine times more high-impact research papers than the second-ranked country (most often the US). The potential threat from Chinese AI is too great to ignore. Now, globally recognised companies at the forefront of their industries – such as Huawei in telecommunications, BYD in electric vehicles and Longi in solar wafers – have come from nowhere in less than 30 years to achieve world-leading positions. Industrial policy in China has, moreover, deliberately targeted key choke points in the supply chain, such that the US was this week forced to abandon its ban on the export of H20 Nvidia chips to China in return for China lifting similar export restrictions on the rare earth minerals vital to many hi-tech industries. The Nvidia ban was completely pointless in any case, serving only to turbocharge Chinese attempts to develop alternatives. Autor and Hanson suggest that the correct response to the China 2.0 shock is for the US to act in unison with commercial allies such as the EU, Japan, Canada, the UK, Australia and South Korea. Loading Counter-intuitively, Chinese companies should also be encouraged to set up production facilities in the US and elsewhere, rather similarly to the way that China once enticed Western companies to do the same in China as a way of speeding up technology transfer. Replicating Chinese industrial policy by aggressively promoting innovation in new fields, as happened in America and Europe during the Second World War, could also help narrow China's lead. It scarcely needs saying that Trump's America is at present doing the opposite of all these things. But just because Trump has got his head buried in the sand doesn't mean other nations should do the same. The potential threat from Chinese AI is too great to ignore. If China gets there first, it will reshape the world in its own image, and 'the end of history' will look very different from the one outlined by Francis Fukuyama back in 1992, when he declared the final triumph of liberal democracy.
The Age
6 minutes ago
- The Age
Trump stumbled on Epstein, and Rupert Murdoch has pounced
Trump needs these viewers to help him stay in power – aided by the fawning Fox talent who are so attuned to his cause that many have been recruited to senior roles at the White House, including Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth. Murdoch also needs these viewers if he wants to remain such a rich and powerful political force in the US. It means Murdoch has had to draw careful battle lines between his own media fiefdoms. News Corp offered the full-throated defence of the WSJ story: 'We have full confidence in the rigor and accuracy of our reporting, and will vigorously defend against any lawsuit,' it said. The WSJ doubled down, reporting that Attorney General Pam Bondi informed President Donald Trump in May that his name appeared multiple times in the government's files on Epstein. The message from inside News Corp is Rupert and Lachlan Murdoch are determined not to cave in to Trump and will go to court if necessary. Loading The Washington Post quoted Rupert telling associates: 'I'm 94 years old, and I will not be intimidated.' Meanwhile at Fox, the lawsuit and allegations have warranted a tepid mention at best. Australian columnist Miranda Divine, now at News Corp's Republican mouthpiece, the New York Post, described the WSJ reports as a 'nothingburger'. And if this delicate dance can be maintained, it will be lucrative for Murdoch. Both News Corp and Fox shares hit record highs in February, just weeks after Trump's inauguration. And there was no hiding Trump's role in the success of Fox News – the most profitable Fox Corp business – when Lachlan presented its most recent quarterly results in May. 'Nowhere is Fox's leadership more evident than Fox News,' he told analysts and investors. Ratings were up 30 per cent for the network in April, and it clinched top spot on prime-time ratings last week over mainstream networks such as CBS and ABC. This is a feat unheard of for a cable news network. 'The momentum that we're seeing within Fox News, obviously driven first by really sort of record-setting audience and share, that's flown through nicely to the revenue line,' Lachlan said. The problem for Rupert is that pandering to his Fox audience means pandering to Trump, and he has never been a fan of Trump's political aspirations. Murdoch publicly supported other candidates during the 2016 campaign before embracing Trump when his candidacy became inevitable. He has tolerated Trump's White House, and maintained close ties, but quickly tried to move the Republican base on to fresh leadership after the 2020 election loss. Murdoch said at the time: 'We want to make Trump a non-person.' That manoeuvre ended badly when Fox's acceptance of the result led to viewers defecting in droves to channels more loyal to Trump's claims that the election was stolen. It promised to be a financial disaster and Fox scrambled back into favour with an about-face supporting the stolen election theory. It is still counting the cost. In 2023, Fox paid Dominion Voting Systems $US787 million to settle claims the network promoted lies about the 2020 presidential election. It still faces a multibillion-dollar lawsuit from another voting systems provider, Smartmatic, which will go to court next year if Fox does not make an offer to settle. For Murdoch, the Epstein scandal serves as another opportunity to test Trump's hold on the Republican Party, and it should not prove as costly as the $US10 billion Trump headline suggests. A quick look at the details of his case reveals problems, starting with the fact that it appears to fall over at the first hurdle of failing to notify the WSJ of the lawsuit at least five days before filing it. Loading But that is the least of Trump's issues. 'The complaint is full of sound and fury but lacks legal merit,' Leonard M. Niehoff, a University of Michigan law professor who specialises in media law, told The Washington Post. 'It shouldn't intimidate a news organisation with good lawyers. The Wall Street Journal has those.' The high hurdles for Trump include having to meet the 'actual malice' standard which means proving the WSJ knew the information they published was false. Ironically, this is what Fox was accused of doing in promoting Trump's stolen election claim in 2020. That legal battle taught Murdoch a lesson on the damage that can be done by the legal discovery process, which produced embarrassing and costly revelations – including the contempt both Murdoch and Fox held for Trump's stolen election claims and the man himself. A text surfaced from Tucker Carlson – a Fox network star at that time – referring to Trump saying, 'I hate him passionately'. If Trump continues to pursue this case, the legal discovery process on his relationship with Epstein could further inflame his support base. A clear opportunity to fatally damage Trump's political standing with the Epstein scandal could be the avenue Murdoch is looking to exploit. And if it doesn't damage Trump? Both men are ruthlessly transactional and have made up before. 'We don't want to antagonise Trump further,' Murdoch said in a memo uncovered by the Dominion case. Murdoch explained in a later deposition relating to that matter: 'He had a very large following, and they were probably mostly viewers of Fox, so it would have been stupid.' And we know Trump's proven ability to chicken out and distract. Loading As he posted to Truth Social followers this week, survival comes first. 'Winning is important, but survival is even more important. If you don't survive, you don't get to fight the next battle.' Wise words for both sides as his latest battle with Murdoch gathers a head of steam.
Sydney Morning Herald
6 minutes ago
- Sydney Morning Herald
A China shock 2.0 is emerging to rock America
Yet instead of pursuing the policies needed to meet this threat head-on, the MAGA agenda is heavily focused on fighting the last war – on bringing manufacturing jobs lost to China and elsewhere back to the US. The challenge, Autor and Hanson argue, is not that of attempting to resuscitate the industrial might of a bygone age, but ensuring that the US is front and centre of the new technologies and able to convincingly harness them to its own ends. This endeavour is not obviously helped by Trump's scattergun approach to tariffs, punishing friend and foe alike, his propensity to alienate rather than co-operate with allies, the stupefying attacks on scientific research and the repudiation of foreign talent – once the very lifeblood of American advancement. Nor is it helped by the administration's casual disregard for the great asset of dollar hegemony which, bizarrely, Stephen Miran, Trump's chief economic adviser, seems to regard as in some way partly responsible for America's de-industrialisation. An administration seemingly hell-bent on fiscal ruin, and on weakening the dollar for the purposes of making US goods more competitive, doesn't exactly inspire international confidence in the dollar as a reserve currency asset. Loading China, by contrast, is investing heavily in the digital yuan as a way of internationalising its own currency, of offering an alternative to the fool's gold of cryptocurrency and of usurping the dollar for cross-border payments. Already, it is making steady progress. Why any longer should Brazil use the dollar for selling soybeans to China when Trump threatens the country with punitive tariffs for the sin of prosecuting his friend, Jair Bolsonaro, the former Brazilian president? Why indeed should it employ the dollar at all when the US regularly uses its power for extraterritorial purposes? In the developing world, Western influence is waning fast; China has been quick and single-minded at moving into its place. China has many problems and challenges, from the demographic to the still-deflating credit and property bubbles. But its catch-up and overtake approach to the technologies of the future is already paying big dividends. As, too, is the aggressive expansion of China's universities sector, originally begun under Jiang Zemin's presidency in the late 1990s, and heavily focused on Stem (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) subjects. According to the Australian Strategic Policy Institute (ASPI), the US-led China in 60 of 64 frontier technologies as recently as 2007, judged by share of the world's most-cited research, while China led the US in three. However, by 2023, these rankings were reversed, with China leading in 57 of 64 key technologies, and the US in seven. 'China has built the foundations to position itself as the world's leading science and technology superpower, by establishing a sometimes stunning lead in high-impact research across the majority of critical and emerging technology domains,' the ASPI says. All of the world's top 10 research institutions in some technologies are based in China, and are already collectively generating nine times more high-impact research papers than the second-ranked country (most often the US). The potential threat from Chinese AI is too great to ignore. Now, globally recognised companies at the forefront of their industries – such as Huawei in telecommunications, BYD in electric vehicles and Longi in solar wafers – have come from nowhere in less than 30 years to achieve world-leading positions. Industrial policy in China has, moreover, deliberately targeted key choke points in the supply chain, such that the US was this week forced to abandon its ban on the export of H20 Nvidia chips to China in return for China lifting similar export restrictions on the rare earth minerals vital to many hi-tech industries. The Nvidia ban was completely pointless in any case, serving only to turbocharge Chinese attempts to develop alternatives. Autor and Hanson suggest that the correct response to the China 2.0 shock is for the US to act in unison with commercial allies such as the EU, Japan, Canada, the UK, Australia and South Korea. Loading Counter-intuitively, Chinese companies should also be encouraged to set up production facilities in the US and elsewhere, rather similarly to the way that China once enticed Western companies to do the same in China as a way of speeding up technology transfer. Replicating Chinese industrial policy by aggressively promoting innovation in new fields, as happened in America and Europe during the Second World War, could also help narrow China's lead. It scarcely needs saying that Trump's America is at present doing the opposite of all these things. But just because Trump has got his head buried in the sand doesn't mean other nations should do the same. The potential threat from Chinese AI is too great to ignore. If China gets there first, it will reshape the world in its own image, and 'the end of history' will look very different from the one outlined by Francis Fukuyama back in 1992, when he declared the final triumph of liberal democracy.
