Innholdsfortegnelse for 2/14/2020 i Newsweek International

AS IN ECCLESIASTES, SO WITH POP MUSIC: THERE’S nothing really new under the sun. At their best, song-makers ape each other shamelessly (and sometimes litigiously), whether that means chord sequences, beats, melodic figures or even lyrical hooks. Bob Dylan copped Woody Guthrie down to his flow-and-fingerpicking, John Mellencamp did a fairly good Dylan impression and ad infinitum it goes. Oscar Wilde laid it down with pith and vinegar: “Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery that mediocrity can pay to greatness.” Then again, one is ever astonished how every season reveals yet another tiny twist in pop music’s often repetitive journey. Amy Winehouse was not just a great singer, but a knowing, postmodern nod to soul icons past; Kendrick Lamar’s melding of jazz textures and 21st-century beats was a welcome…

IN 2011, a novel virus,MEV-1, emerged from China and quickly spread throughout the world, killing 2.5 million people in the U.S. and 26 million worldwide. That outbreak wasn’t actually real—it was the plot of the film Contagion, providing a Hollywood-style glimpse into the panic that surrounds a global pandemic. At the moment, we’re in the midst of a very real outbreak spreading throughout the world from China. The real outbreak and the fictional one are related in one important way: a virus made the “jump” into an unprepared world. This new outbreak is both frightening and familiar. Looking back over many decades, recent viral outbreaks fit a pattern that is now well-recognized. It goes like this: A virus that lives in animals makes the jump to humans. Perhaps it happens…

01 The Oculus New York, New York Designed by Santiago Calatrava, the Oculus serves as a transit hub to the rebuilt World Trade Center, a mall and an arresting piece of architecture. Some compare its sculptural white curved pillars to bones of a ribcage. 02 Universidad de Chile Metro Station Santiago, Chile Visitors to this station in Chile’s capital cannot miss the huge mural entitled Memoria Visual de una Nación (Visual Memory of a Nation) by Mario Toral. The 12,917 square foot mural—installed in two parts in 1996 and 1999—covers all the walls and depicts the history of Chile. 03 São Bento Railway and Metro Station Porto, Portugal Considerably older than many of its peers, this station was completed in 1916 and is built on the site…

“The U.S. has gotten the redistribution part down, but in our case we redistribute to each according to his voting clout.” I AM A CAPITALIST BECAUSE I remember socialism. I was converted to capitalism by a few years at the University of Chicago and a few decades working internationally and seeing socialism up close and personal. Until recently, I was confident that we need not worry about trying that experiment again because socialism had been tested and had failed. It looks like I was wrong. Socialism is on the rise. Don’t blame Bernie and Elizabeth. Blame ourselves. Here’s why. The version of capitalism we have implemented is a flawed one. Capitalism is based on the idea that enlightened self-interest and free markets produce the best possible allocation of resources and…

DURING THE HEIGHT OF TENSIONS WITH IRAN LAST year, the United States conducted an unprecedented series of war games. Over five months, from May until the end of September, 93 separate military exercises were held, with forces operating continuously in, above and around 29 countries. The games, which practiced everything from ground platoon tactics to cyber warfare, weren’t held in the Mideast and weren’t directed at Tehran. They were directed against Moscow—and constituted the most intense, uninterrupted set of drills since the end of the Cold War. The activity was the culmination of a buildup that began after Russia seized Crimea from Ukraine in March 2014. Though American armed forces were fighting several “hot wars” and engaged in crisis deployments in response to both Iran and North Korea, the shift…