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Elastic Justice

For decades, the United States projected itself as the world’s foremost defender of rules-based governance.

Headline: Does Basab Dasgupta Have Great Jeans?

A TV commercial for American Eagles brand jeans, featuring blue-eyed blonde actress Sydney Sweeney, caused a storm of controversies in the US. Many people complained that the tagline “Sydney Sweeney has great jeans” really implies that Sydney has great genes ("jeans" being homophonic with “genes”) – thus promoting white supremacy.

Chip Politics

In a sharp turn from the rhetoric of outright bans, Washington has brokered a deal allowing two of its leading semiconductor firms to resume sales of customised AI chips to China ~ on the condition that 15 per cent of the resulting revenue flows directly to the US government.