As a connoisseur of racism, I have found no greater joy than discovering other language realms on X where they are truly light years ahead. Behold the great meme war between the Turks 🇹🇷 and Chinese 🇨🇳 which has been brewing now for 3 days! It began with a small Turkish account posting a meme of a cat wearing a straw hat + slitty eyes + wispy moustache. A Chinese user then replied with a meme of Patrick Star from SpongeBob parachuting next to the Turkish flag, with a caption along the lines of “I heard the Turkish flag was designed like this, is that true? Both were from small anonymous accounts but now has been viewed by several millions. Turks took it as mockery of a national symbol and all hell breaks lose. The broader historical and cultural pile-on on both sides were equally impressive in its deep knowledge of Ottoman / Chinese history, along with very creative vulgarity. I read one Chinese tweet calling Turkey the fleshlight of the entire world. Both sides insulted each other as “might as well be Indians.” Then it got super testy when it ventured into Turkestan/Xinjiang/Uyghur territory, and soon out came digs about the Turkish lira, China virus and other general nationalist trash talk. The next stage was the free speech Olympics. Turks started posting images of Xi Jinping and daring Chinese users to criticize him to prove that China is “free.” Chinese replies often flipped it to “you criticize Xi but none of you dare criticize Muhammad.” When no Chinese account could criticize Xi, the Turks concluded they were all bots. The latest stage has been the international expansion. Japan + Taiwan + Azerbaijan + Spain lined up with Turks against China. Japanese accounts were the most visible contingent. Taiwan joined the Turkish side for obvious reasons. Azerbaijan was in Turkic solidarity mode. South Korea and Spain too for reasons which are not clear to me. Iran + Greece + India + Egypt joined up with the Chinese against Turkey. I saw an Iranian account openly telling the Chinese to keep going and “discipline the Turks” because the Ottoman/Persian rivalry runs deep still. Greece obviously went against the Turks and as for India, who knows. Could’ve gone either way but they chose the Chinese. The whole thing, while viscous and passionate at times, has strangely left me with the warm fuzzies. Imagine how much more boring life would’ve been without @X’s auto-translate feature

5.6 percent. That’s how much the Bank of Israel now expects the economy to grow this year, up from 4 percent in its July forecast. For 2027, it projects 7.5 percent, up from 5.5 percent. Second-quarter growth, annualized, came in at 15.4 percent, and the Bank says the third quarter points to more of the same. These are not the numbers of a country three years into a multi-front war. If the forecast holds, Israel would outgrow every economy in the OECD, war or no war. You’d hardly know it. The headlines went to the interest rate, which the Bank held at 3.25 percent, exactly as every economist polled expected. There is a catch, and it’s the same thing driving the boom. Much of the upward revision comes from production abroad by Israeli firms, essentially high tech. Israel’s economy is racing ahead, but on one wheel. That output counts toward GDP, yet as Governor Amir Yaron pointed out, it doesn’t use many Israeli workers or much Israeli capital, and most of the income never reaches Israeli households. Strip it out, and growth drops to 3.4 percent in 2026 and 5.1 percent in 2027. Even the discounted version would be the envy of most of Europe. And the 7.5 percent headline is sturdier than it looks. It’s built on edge-case assumptions that are already partly priced in, so barring another round with Iran, the real number shouldn’t land more than a point or a point and a half away. Call the floor for 2027 around 6 percent. The rest of the forecast is similarly optimistic. Unemployment is expected to average 3 percent in 2027. Inflation sits at 1.5 percent this year and 2.1 percent next, comfortably inside the target range. Debt-to-GDP is projected to fall from about 68 percent at the end of 2026 to 66.5 percent a year later. The deficit is projected at 4.4 percent of GDP this year and 4.6 percent next, provided defense spending doesn’t grow beyond what’s already budgeted. For a country that may be on the edge of another war with Iran, that’s quite a proviso. Yaron, for his part, wasn’t celebrating. He warned that the next government will face tough fiscal choices and will need serious growth-enhancing reforms if the economy is going to stay this resilient. Next Tuesday, Israelis vote after a campaign that has argued about nearly everything except the economy. Judging by the Bank’s numbers, the economy hasn’t noticed.

UC Merced Prof. Sean Malloy calls for “dezionizing” the University of California. He compares it to denazification. Among his proposals: An independent University Committee on Dezionization to conduct show trials and “formulate appropriate remedies and forms of accountability.”