2018
March
09
Friday

Monitor Daily Podcast

March 09, 2018
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Clayton Collins
Director of Editorial Innovation

The idea of “adjusted expectations” can carry a whiff of compromise. This week brought reminders that the adjustment can also be upward.

It began with post-Oscar buzz about Frances McDormand’s rousing call for “inclusion riders” – at least one production company quickly got on board. Melinda Gates would opine about the transformative power of putting money in “the hands of women who have the authority to use it.”

It was mostly symbolic that some outlets of American cultural juggernaut McDonald’s flipped the logo to form a W in a salute to women. It was arguably at least a small cultural shift when carmakers at a major international auto show shed the tradition of decorative “booth babes.”

Then there were those penguins. A supercolony of more than 1.5 million birds – Adélies, thought to be in rapid decline – is now known to exist on the northern tip of the Antarctic Peninsula. Perspective about the tiny birds’ plight was shifted from space. Satellite images had revealed massive guano fields.

Finally, a development on solar power in California. The state is overproducing relative to its goals. It set two big records this month alone. That stands to renew a push to adopt much more aggressive targets. Old mandate: half the state’s electricity from renewable sources by 2030. Now, how about 100 percent by 2045? That’s raising expectations.

Now to our five stories for your Friday, highlighting the importance of equal opportunity, of always favoring a closer look, and of choosing innovation over closing doors.


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Today’s stories

And why we wrote them

Yes, the monthly job-creation numbers that came out today were very strong. But there’s more. Wages at the bottom end of the pay scale are improving, possibly in a more persistent way than usual. That’s significant in an era of high income inequality. 

In an opinion piece in The New York Times Thursday, Sen. John McCain and actor-activist Angelina Jolie decried what they called America’s “failure to hold accountable those who commit mass atrocities and human rights abuses” in Myanmar, calling years of progress “squandered.” Syria, too, now presents a sobering question: Can humanitarian concern no longer overrule what seems to be cold reality?

Eric Gay/AP
A podium awaited speakers at a Democratic watch party following the Texas primary election March 6 in Austin.

You can’t wish a bellwether into being. Primary results early this week in Texas had some poll-watchers setting up the state as a microcosm of a national political shift. This piece looks at the problems that can come with that sort of extrapolation. 

Special Report

Gun laws and gun violence: What states’ experiences show

What’s the relationship between gun laws and lives saved? We gave four young staffers with a keen interest in data journalism three days to probe that question at the state level. By last night our lead designer reported having “work dreams” about how best to express their mound of findings. (You’ll want to click through the email to the enriched, site-hosted version for this one.)

SOURCE:

State Firearm Laws Project; Centers for Disease Control and Prevention

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RESEARCH: Story Hinckley, Rebecca Asoulin, Noble Ingram, Asia Palomba; GRAPHIC: Jacob Turcotte/Staff
Michael Holtz/The Christian Science Monitor
Hot springs create steam above the quiet neighborhood of Ogura in Beppu, Japan.

What happens when a long-cherished tradition clashes with sustainability? Sometimes it forces a tough choice. But as this piece from a Japanese city shows, it can also bubble up innovation.


The Monitor's View

AP Photo
A woman in Tokyo walks by a huge screen showing President Donald Trump and North Korea's leader Kim Jong Un on March 9, 2018.

In the history of diplomatic firsts, there has never been something quite like this: Over the past year, President Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong-un have called each other nothing but belittling names. Then suddenly on March 8, they called for a befriending summit, perhaps by May.

In just one year, the two men have gone from demonization to fraternization. Instead of a military face-off, they will now engage in mannerly face time.

The about-face is head snapping. And yet isn’t personal interaction exactly the secret sauce of any successful negotiation? Each side needs look-you-in-the-eye moments to take a measure of each other’s trust and respect. They need to shed stereotypes. They must listen carefully for each other’s cry for dignity and for the narrative of fear that drives them toward an often unspoken goal. Only then, after the de-demonizing, might a summit between enemies get down to hard issues.

The historic summit will come preloaded with minor concessions. North Korea claims it is ready to denuclearize, will refrain from any nuclear or missile tests for now, and accepts that the annual joint military exercises of South Korea and the United States will take place this spring. For the US, simply granting the North’s longtime wish – being treated as an equal to the US in a summit – is a victory for its desire of legitimacy.

The US came close to giving away that gift in 2000. A top North Korean general visited the Clinton White House and then-Secretary of State Madeleine Albright visited Mr. Kim’s father, Kim Jong-il, in Pyongyang. But President Bill Clinton, just before he left office, decided not to pursue a summit.

The Trump-Kim summit will be made easier by the fact that Kim and South Korean President Moon Jae-in will meet a month earlier. While the 1950-53 war on the Korean Peninsula and the simmering conflict since then have been a power play of ideology and big-power maneuvers, the real issue is the civil divide of the Korean people. China and the US, for all their influence, must wait for that reconciliation.

Each side in this US-North Korea meeting may believe it is negotiating from a position of strength. Kim has nuclear weapons in place with rockets to carry them. Mr. Trump sees his “maximum pressure” campaign of sanctions as working along with hints of a stealth attack on the North’s nuclear facilities.

Yet standing down from such tough positions will require stepping up to cleareyed perceptions of each other’s ultimate intentions. How much will the US help revive the dormant North Korean economy? Is North Korea afraid of China’s bullying of its Asian neighbors? Does the US want regime change in Pyongyang? Is Kim, yet again, just buying time or angling for aid concessions?

The diplomatic prep work for this summit must narrow down such questions to the essential few. Only then can Trump and Kim use their time together for the hard work: building a relationship of trust that can lead to verifiable results. The world will be listening to how well they listen to each other.


A Christian Science Perspective

About this feature

Today’s contributor shares how she found freedom from a three-pack-a-day smoking habit as she gained a more spiritual sense of her identity.


A message of love

Jason Lee/Reuters
Ushers pose for a photo in Tiananmen Square as delegates attend the second plenary session of the National People's Congress in Beijing March 9. The most high-profile issue this year: announced plans to drop a clause in the country’s Constitution that limits the president to two consecutive five-year terms.
( The illustrations in today’s Monitor Daily are by Karen Norris. )

A look ahead

Thanks, as always, for being with us today. Enjoy the weekend. Among the stories we’re working on for Monday: The announced meeting between President Trump and Kim Jong-un almost certainly won’t lead to North Korea’s denuclearization. But that doesn’t mean it won't have positive results. We’ll look at what could go right. 

Bonus weekend read: Peter Rainer’s review of Roland Joffe’s powerful film “The Forgiven,” about the interaction between Archbishop Desmond Tutu and an unrepentant white separatist in newly post-apartheid South Africa. 

More issues

2018
March
09
Friday
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