China has started to hit back at the wave of attacks upon it as the originator of the Chinese virus, the Wuhan virus, the power that unleashed this pandemic on to the world. The first target of this retaliation has been Australia, where 80% tariffs have been imposed on goods and services, making it almost impossible for Australia to export to China. Unkind critics have suggested that Australia is the gum on China’s shoe, making the choice of Australia as the first target more easily understood. However, there may be others very soon: as America ramps up hostility and propaganda, individual states are beginning lawsuits against the Chinese government and there is a bill going through the Senate aiming to de-list Chinese firms from the US Stock Exchange. To find out more about why China feels so aggrieved, we invited Mario Cavolo, an author and businessman based in China, to discuss the scapegoating.
This week, many of us were buzzing over the fact that it was World Bee Day, aimed to spread awareness of the significance of bees. Bees will soon perish on their own, but as a colony they are organized to interact and behave as one. The queen is key to a hive, a paradox not lost on any republican. However, as soon as the queen’s use is over, the colony practice regicide, ironically rendering the rulers of the hive drones and workers rather the queen bee. As a planet, we rely heavily on pollinators, making bees enormously important to all of us. So, we invited the Bolshevik Beekeeper, Chris Turner, to tell us more.
