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Grow Up About Dictators, America!

The U.S. Democratic primary has exposed an obsession with morality when it comes to foreign policy that is harmful to strategic and moral objectives alike, Stephen M. Walt writes.




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The Future of the Transatlantic Defense Relationship: Views from Finland and the EU

February 7, 2020: With the advent of the digital age and the rise of Russia and China as global powers, the EU must do more to defend itself and its relationship with the United States, according to Janne Kuusela, Director General Janne Kuusela. In an event moderated by  Cathryn Clüver Ashbrook, Executive Director of the Future of Diplomacy Project and the Project on Europe and the Transatlantic Relationship he explained why Finland could be a potential paradigm for the EU’s defense strategy. 

 




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The battle of 'resistance' vs 'revolution' in the Middle East

The events surrounding the US assassination of Iranian Quds Force leader Major General Qassem Soleimani brought to the surface the two main ideological forces that now battle each other across the Middle East - the anti-imperial "resistance" of Iran and its Arab allies, and the freedom "revolution" of domestic protesters in the same lands. 




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H-Diplo Review Essay 192 on Lawson. Anatomies of Revolution

Emily Whalen reviews Anatomies of Revolution by George Lawson (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2019).




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Grow Up About Dictators, America!

The U.S. Democratic primary has exposed an obsession with morality when it comes to foreign policy that is harmful to strategic and moral objectives alike, Stephen M. Walt writes.




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The Future of the Transatlantic Defense Relationship: Views from Finland and the EU

February 7, 2020: With the advent of the digital age and the rise of Russia and China as global powers, the EU must do more to defend itself and its relationship with the United States, according to Janne Kuusela, Director General Janne Kuusela. In an event moderated by  Cathryn Clüver Ashbrook, Executive Director of the Future of Diplomacy Project and the Project on Europe and the Transatlantic Relationship he explained why Finland could be a potential paradigm for the EU’s defense strategy. 

 




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Sutil has 'more than one option' for 2012

Adrian Sutil says he has more than one option for a race seat on 2012 as he looks to get a deal signed before the end of the year




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Oil Markets Provide a Glimpse of the Post-Pandemic Future

Henry Kissinger warns that many existing domestic and international institutions that have helped govern the past decades will not survive the Covid-19 crisis. He is surely correct.




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Will the New Oil Pact Open a Broader Dialogue Between Trump and Putin?

Since President Trump moved into the White House, he has been eager for a dramatic initiative with Russian President Vladimir Putin, and he may finally have found one in Sunday’s announcement of a joint American-Russian-Saudi effort to stabilize world oil prices.




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This Virus Is Tough, but History Provides Perspective: The 1968 Pandemic and the Vietnam War

Nathaniel L. Moir recounts the events of 1968: The war in Vietnam and extensive civil unrest in the United States — and yet another big problem that made life harder. In 1968, the H3N2 pandemic killed more individuals in the United States than the combined total number of American fatalities during both the Vietnam and Korean Wars.




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How the AfCFTA will improve access to ‘essential products’ and bolster Africa’s resilience to respond to future pandemics

Africa’s extreme vulnerability to the disruption of international supply chains during the COVID-19 pandemic highlights the need to reduce the continent’s dependence on non-African trading partners and unlock Africa’s business potential. While African countries are right to focus their energy on managing the immediate health crisis, they must not lose sight of finalizing the Africa…

       




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Creating Subnational Climate Institutions in China

This discussion paper (available in English and Chinese) describes the evolution of decentralization over the reform period that began in China in 1978, different theories of institutional change in China, and how the empirical and theoretical literatures help scholars and policymakers understand the development of institutions for governing GHG-emitting activities.




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The Value of Carbon Capture, Utilization, and Sequestration

Growing concern around climate change has ignited recent interest in carbon capture, utilization, and storage (CCUS) technologies and generated a series of studies on its global market potential.




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Harvard Business School Professor Rebecca Henderson Outlines Ways Organizations are Changing in Response to the Coronavirus Pandemic and Climate Change in New Edition of "Environmental Insights"

Rebecca Henderson, the John and Natty McArthur University Professor at Harvard University, shared her perspectives on how large organizations are changing in response to the coronavirus pandemic and climate change in the newest episode of "Environmental Insights: Discussions on Policy and Practice from the Harvard Environmental Economics Program," a podcast produced by the Harvard Environmental Economics Program. Listen to the interview here. Listen to the interview here.




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Section 2: Supporting Disadvantaged Youth


     
 
 




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Can we take the politics out of the federal minimum wage?


At 77 years of age, the federal minimum wage deserves a respite from the day-to-day combat of political life. Today, protestors around the country are demanding a $15 minimum. But few observers think this level is economically desirable: even fewer think that it is likely.

Democrats want a higher minimum, and say so loudly. Republicans of a free-market persuasion mostly do not—but tend to stay silent because they know that swing voters look positively at raising the wages of low-earners.

The minimum wage is lagging…

Congressional political stalemate has meant the U.S. wage floor has lagged behind median earnings. In contrast wage growth in other OECD countries has performed much better, as this graph produced by the Hamilton Project shows:

Advanced nations have de-politicized minimum wage decisions

The federal minimum wage is an established piece of the U.S. policy furniture—and one that is quite dated. It now makes sense to consider taking some of the power and responsibility for setting the wage rate out of the hands of politicians—just as interest rates are set by the Federal Reserve.

This is not a novel proposal in international terms. In most advanced economies, minimum wage decisions are not purely political. Out of 66 countries studied by Tito Boeri in 2009, 24 delegate the determination the minimum wage level to a tripartite body; 26 countries set the minimum wage after taking advice following formal consultation between the Government and representatives of employers and workers; and just 16 countries (including the U.S.) set the minimum wage through a simple legislative vote.

Over in the U.K., the Conservative Prime Minister David Cameron just jacked up the national minimum wage by 3% up to £6.70, with barely a squeak of protest from employers or the right wing of his own party. Why? Because, like his two predecessors, he simply followed the advice of the Low Pay Commission, which is comprised of nine commissioners—three each from trade unions, employer organizations and academia.

Two options for taking the political heat out of the U.S. minimum wage

Can the U.S. follow suit? And if it can, what might the new system look like? Two options at least are worth considering.

1. A Federal Minimum Wage Advisory Board. This could be made up (like the U.K. version) of nine members: three representatives of employer organizations, three from labor organizations, and three independent labor economists. The Board would recommend a rate for the national minimum wage each year, which would then be enacted by Congress in the usual manner. The Board would have a strong incentive to set a rate likely to be adopted by Congress, in order to establish and maintain its reputation: there is, after all, little point in sitting on a Board that is ignored. The Board’s recommendation would not be binding and would not become the legal ‘default’ level. But because the advice is likely to be sensible, Congress would likely be inclined to follow it.

2. Wage Indexation. An alternative—favored by my Brookings colleague Gary Burtless—would be to simultaneously raise the minimum wage and introduce automatic indexing, lifting the minimum wage at the same rate as either consumer prices or the median wage—preferably the latter. In effect, this would do for the minimum wage what President Nixon did for Social Security. Congress would have the power to suspend a rise—perhaps if unemployment reached a certain threshold—but the default position would be to link changes in the minimum wage to changes in the median wage or in the broader consumer economy.

Policy commitment devices in action

These are both examples of what I have called policy commitment devices—in a new paper, Ulysses Goes to Washington—that help to overcome political myopia in order to support longer-term policy objectives. In the first case, taking advice from an independent commission, the commitment is somewhat less binding, although as James Madison knew, ‘the counsels and checks of friends’ can carry plenty of weight. Indexation would be a tighter form of binding, since inaction on the part of politicians would lead to an uprating of minimum wage, rather than the current stasis.

For both sides, there are political attractions to sub-contracting some decision-making power over the minimum wage. By accepting the advice of an independent body or allowing indexation to do its silent work, Republicans can keep their business donors and right-wing critics at bay; Democrats can do the same for unions and the political left. Sometimes the most powerful thing politicians can do is give some power away. The minimum wage is now perhaps a case in point.

Image Source: © Brian Snyder / Reuters
      
 
 




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What can COVID-19 teach us about strengthening education systems?

As cases of coronavirus (COVID-19) in the United States rise, more and more states have adopted shelter-in-place orders to curtail the pandemic. The disruption to most Americans’ daily lives has been drastic and sudden—and perhaps one of the most dramatic shifts was education’s move to a virtual setting. Even before the current pandemic forced school closures,…

       




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Accumulating Evidence Using Crowdsourcing and Machine Learning: A Living Bibliography about Existential Risk and Global Catastrophic Risk

The study of existential risk — the risk of human extinction or the collapse of human civilization — has only recently emerged as an integrated field of research, and yet an overwhelming volume of relevant research has already been published. To provide an evidence base for policy and risk analysis, this research should be systematically reviewed. In a systematic review, one of many time-consuming tasks is to read the titles and abstracts of research publications, to see if they meet the inclusion criteria. The authors show how this task can be shared between multiple people (using crowdsourcing) and partially automated (using machine learning), as methods of handling an overwhelming volume of research.




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Budapest Memorandum at 25: Between Past and Future

On December 5, 1994, leaders of the United States, the United Kingdom, and the Russian Federation met in Budapest, Hungary, to pledge security assurances to Ukraine in connection with its accession to the Treaty on the Nonproliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT) as a non-nuclear-weapons state. The signature of the so-called Budapest Memorandum concluded arduous negotiations that resulted in Ukraine’s agreement to relinquish the world’s third-largest nuclear arsenal, which the country inherited from the collapsed Soviet Union, and transfer all nuclear warheads to Russia for dismantlement. The signatories of the memorandum pledged to respect Ukraine’s territorial integrity and inviolability of its borders, and to refrain from the use or threat of military force. Russia breached these commitments with its annexation of Crimea in 2014 and aggression in eastern Ukraine, bringing the meaning and value of security assurance pledged in the Memorandum under renewed scrutiny.

On the occasion of the 25th anniversary of the memorandum’s signature, the Project on Managing the Atom at the Belfer Center for Science & International Affairs at the Harvard Kennedy School, with the support of the Center for U.S.-Ukrainian Relations and the Harvard Ukrainian Research Institute, hosted a conference to revisit the history of the Budapest Memorandum, consider the repercussions of its violation for international security and the broader nonproliferation regime, and draw lessons for the future. The conference brought together academics, practitioners, and experts who have contributed to developing U.S. policy toward post-Soviet nuclear disarmament, participated in the negotiations of the Budapest Memorandum, and dealt with the repercussions of its breach in 2014. The conference highlighted five key lessons learned from the experience of Ukraine’s disarmament, highlighted at the conference.




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Poll: What the American Public Likes and Hates about Trump's Nuclear Policies

The authors conducted a study which highlights how the U.S. public as a whole and various demographic groups view President Donald Trump's positions on nuclear weapons.




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McLaren won't be getting knocked out in Q1 for long - Alonso

Fernando Alonso is confident McLaren will not be getting knocked out of Q1 for long this season despite his first qualifying session with McLaren leaving him 18th on the grid at the Malaysian Grand Prix




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Coronavirus has shown us a world without traffic. Can we sustain it?

There are few silver linings to the COVID-19 pandemic, but free-flowing traffic is certainly one of them. For the essential workers who still must commute each day, driving to work has suddenly become much easier. The same applies to the trucks delivering our surging e-commerce orders. Removing so many cars from the roads has even…

       




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Big city downtowns are booming, but can their momentum outlast the coronavirus?

It was only a generation ago when many Americans left downtowns for dead. From New York to Chicago to Los Angeles, residents fled urban cores in droves after World War II. While many businesses stayed, it wasn’t uncommon to find entire downtowns with little street life after 5:00 PM. Many of those former residents relocated…

       




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NATO and outer space: Now what?

At the North Atlantic Treaty Organization’s (NATO) December 2019 Leader’s Summit in London, leaders acknowledged that technology is rapidly changing the international security environment, stating: “To stay secure, we must look to the future together. We are addressing the breadth and scale of new technologies to maintain our technological edge.”  Leaders also identified outer space…

       




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Why the AI revolution hasn’t swept the military

In games such as chess and Go, artificial intelligence has repeatedly demonstrated its ability to outwit the experts. Ad networks and recommendation engines are getting eerily good at predicting what consumers want to buy next. Artificial intelligence, it seems, is changing many aspects of our lives, especially on the internet. But what has been described…

       




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Oil Markets Provide a Glimpse of the Post-Pandemic Future

Henry Kissinger warns that many existing domestic and international institutions that have helped govern the past decades will not survive the Covid-19 crisis. He is surely correct.




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Accumulating Evidence Using Crowdsourcing and Machine Learning: A Living Bibliography about Existential Risk and Global Catastrophic Risk

The study of existential risk — the risk of human extinction or the collapse of human civilization — has only recently emerged as an integrated field of research, and yet an overwhelming volume of relevant research has already been published. To provide an evidence base for policy and risk analysis, this research should be systematically reviewed. In a systematic review, one of many time-consuming tasks is to read the titles and abstracts of research publications, to see if they meet the inclusion criteria. The authors show how this task can be shared between multiple people (using crowdsourcing) and partially automated (using machine learning), as methods of handling an overwhelming volume of research.




ut

Budapest Memorandum at 25: Between Past and Future

On December 5, 1994, leaders of the United States, the United Kingdom, and the Russian Federation met in Budapest, Hungary, to pledge security assurances to Ukraine in connection with its accession to the Treaty on the Nonproliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT) as a non-nuclear-weapons state. The signature of the so-called Budapest Memorandum concluded arduous negotiations that resulted in Ukraine’s agreement to relinquish the world’s third-largest nuclear arsenal, which the country inherited from the collapsed Soviet Union, and transfer all nuclear warheads to Russia for dismantlement. The signatories of the memorandum pledged to respect Ukraine’s territorial integrity and inviolability of its borders, and to refrain from the use or threat of military force. Russia breached these commitments with its annexation of Crimea in 2014 and aggression in eastern Ukraine, bringing the meaning and value of security assurance pledged in the Memorandum under renewed scrutiny.

On the occasion of the 25th anniversary of the memorandum’s signature, the Project on Managing the Atom at the Belfer Center for Science & International Affairs at the Harvard Kennedy School, with the support of the Center for U.S.-Ukrainian Relations and the Harvard Ukrainian Research Institute, hosted a conference to revisit the history of the Budapest Memorandum, consider the repercussions of its violation for international security and the broader nonproliferation regime, and draw lessons for the future. The conference brought together academics, practitioners, and experts who have contributed to developing U.S. policy toward post-Soviet nuclear disarmament, participated in the negotiations of the Budapest Memorandum, and dealt with the repercussions of its breach in 2014. The conference highlighted five key lessons learned from the experience of Ukraine’s disarmament, highlighted at the conference.




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Poll: What the American Public Likes and Hates about Trump's Nuclear Policies

The authors conducted a study which highlights how the U.S. public as a whole and various demographic groups view President Donald Trump's positions on nuclear weapons.




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Accumulating Evidence Using Crowdsourcing and Machine Learning: A Living Bibliography about Existential Risk and Global Catastrophic Risk

The study of existential risk — the risk of human extinction or the collapse of human civilization — has only recently emerged as an integrated field of research, and yet an overwhelming volume of relevant research has already been published. To provide an evidence base for policy and risk analysis, this research should be systematically reviewed. In a systematic review, one of many time-consuming tasks is to read the titles and abstracts of research publications, to see if they meet the inclusion criteria. The authors show how this task can be shared between multiple people (using crowdsourcing) and partially automated (using machine learning), as methods of handling an overwhelming volume of research.




ut

Budapest Memorandum at 25: Between Past and Future

On December 5, 1994, leaders of the United States, the United Kingdom, and the Russian Federation met in Budapest, Hungary, to pledge security assurances to Ukraine in connection with its accession to the Treaty on the Nonproliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT) as a non-nuclear-weapons state. The signature of the so-called Budapest Memorandum concluded arduous negotiations that resulted in Ukraine’s agreement to relinquish the world’s third-largest nuclear arsenal, which the country inherited from the collapsed Soviet Union, and transfer all nuclear warheads to Russia for dismantlement. The signatories of the memorandum pledged to respect Ukraine’s territorial integrity and inviolability of its borders, and to refrain from the use or threat of military force. Russia breached these commitments with its annexation of Crimea in 2014 and aggression in eastern Ukraine, bringing the meaning and value of security assurance pledged in the Memorandum under renewed scrutiny.

On the occasion of the 25th anniversary of the memorandum’s signature, the Project on Managing the Atom at the Belfer Center for Science & International Affairs at the Harvard Kennedy School, with the support of the Center for U.S.-Ukrainian Relations and the Harvard Ukrainian Research Institute, hosted a conference to revisit the history of the Budapest Memorandum, consider the repercussions of its violation for international security and the broader nonproliferation regime, and draw lessons for the future. The conference brought together academics, practitioners, and experts who have contributed to developing U.S. policy toward post-Soviet nuclear disarmament, participated in the negotiations of the Budapest Memorandum, and dealt with the repercussions of its breach in 2014. The conference highlighted five key lessons learned from the experience of Ukraine’s disarmament, highlighted at the conference.




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Poll: What the American Public Likes and Hates about Trump's Nuclear Policies

The authors conducted a study which highlights how the U.S. public as a whole and various demographic groups view President Donald Trump's positions on nuclear weapons.




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Creating Subnational Climate Institutions in China

This discussion paper (available in English and Chinese) describes the evolution of decentralization over the reform period that began in China in 1978, different theories of institutional change in China, and how the empirical and theoretical literatures help scholars and policymakers understand the development of institutions for governing GHG-emitting activities.




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The Value of Carbon Capture, Utilization, and Sequestration

Growing concern around climate change has ignited recent interest in carbon capture, utilization, and storage (CCUS) technologies and generated a series of studies on its global market potential.




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Harvard Business School Professor Rebecca Henderson Outlines Ways Organizations are Changing in Response to the Coronavirus Pandemic and Climate Change in New Edition of "Environmental Insights"

Rebecca Henderson, the John and Natty McArthur University Professor at Harvard University, shared her perspectives on how large organizations are changing in response to the coronavirus pandemic and climate change in the newest episode of "Environmental Insights: Discussions on Policy and Practice from the Harvard Environmental Economics Program," a podcast produced by the Harvard Environmental Economics Program. Listen to the interview here. Listen to the interview here.




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The Value of Carbon Capture, Utilization, and Sequestration

Growing concern around climate change has ignited recent interest in carbon capture, utilization, and storage (CCUS) technologies and generated a series of studies on its global market potential.




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COVID-19's Painful Lesson About Strategy and Power

Joseph Nye writes that while trade wars have set back economic globalization,  the environmental globalization represented by pandemics and climate change is unstoppable. Borders are becoming more porous to everything from drugs to infectious diseases to cyber terrorism, and the United States must use its soft power of attraction to develop networks and institutions that address these new threats.




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What Economics Can Say about an Effective Response to the Coronavirus

In a recent podcast interview, Robert Stavins and Scott Barrett discussed lessons from historic pandemics, how economists can help with policymaking surrounding the coronavirus, and what the “post-pandemic economic equilibrium” might look like. Resources Magazine has published an abridged version of their conversation.




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Harvard Business School Professor Rebecca Henderson Outlines Ways Organizations are Changing in Response to the Coronavirus Pandemic and Climate Change in New Edition of "Environmental Insights"

Rebecca Henderson, the John and Natty McArthur University Professor at Harvard University, shared her perspectives on how large organizations are changing in response to the coronavirus pandemic and climate change in the newest episode of "Environmental Insights: Discussions on Policy and Practice from the Harvard Environmental Economics Program," a podcast produced by the Harvard Environmental Economics Program. Listen to the interview here. Listen to the interview here.




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Global Problem, Local Solutions

The Arctic Initiative is pairing policy and science scholars with local experts to find practical climate solutions.




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What I Wish I Had Said on CNN About Trump's 'Lysol and Sunshine' Speech

Joel Clement appeared on CNN's Erin Burnett OutFront on April 23, 2020.  In this blog post for the Union of Concerned Scientists, he elaborates on what he wishes he had said during that interview.




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Petrov puts puncture down to bad luck

Renault's Vitaly Petrov has put his puncture when fighting Fernando Alonso in the closing stages of the race down to bad luck




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Turkey could be priced out the F1 market

Bernie Ecclestone has reportedly demanded a doubling of the annual charge to US$26 million if the Turkish Grand Prix is to remain




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McLaren told Hamilton that Button wouldn't pass

Lewis Hamilton was told team-mate Jenson Button would not try to overtake him at the Turkish Grand Prix 10 days ago, seconds before the world champion did so and sparked a duel




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Ready Stefan GP hits out at US F1

Stefan GP will reveal its 2010 car next week in the hope that the FIA will allow it to take the place of any no-shows in this year's championship




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Time running out for Campos, Stefan and US F1

Stefan GP has made one final plea to be accepted into the world championship, after it emerged that merger talks with US F1 had fallen through




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Lopez rules out F1 in 2010

Jose Maria 'Pechito' Lopez will not take part in Formula One this year after his manager revealed that he had not been able to land a reserve driver role at HRT




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Oil Markets Provide a Glimpse of the Post-Pandemic Future

Henry Kissinger warns that many existing domestic and international institutions that have helped govern the past decades will not survive the Covid-19 crisis. He is surely correct.




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Vettel: Third on debut feels like a win

Sebastian Vettel says third on his Ferrari debut felt like a victory in Australia




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Vettel believes win is possible even without rain

Sebastian Vettel confidently declared Ferrari can beat Mercedes come rain or shine in Malaysia after qualifying on the front row of the grid for Sunday's grand prix