Today’s briefing:
— America at 250
— Where TikTok just bet big
— Most famous comedian you never saw
Your Insider’s briefing:
— America at 250
— Where TikTok just bet big
— Most famous comedian you never saw
Good morning {{first_name | Intriguer}}. It’s our week’s final briefing ahead of the big 4th of July celebrations marking 250 years of the United States of America.
So fittingly, today’s edition explores how the US is doing these days: sure, we’ve noticed a few greys, but c’mon, have you seen Clooney? And okay, that gait looks a little unorthodox at times, but maybe it’s a new Jagger swagger?
Anyway, clearly no nation is perfect, but as I reflected on my own “love this country” moments over the years, many actually involve someone yelling ‘dayum’:
Like when I first became a dad and stepped out bleary-eyed onto a Santa Monica street holding celebratory champagne in one arm and a baby (mine) in the other, only to earn a respectful ‘dayum’ from a passing celeb, or
A guy going viral crying ‘dayum’ to the heavens at his first Five Guys burger, or
When I was walking through a ritzy Palm Springs hotel foyer in my shiny new Nikes and a staff member stopped me dead, dropped into a full 360 around those sweet new kicks, then walked off yelling ‘dayum’ at startled onlookers.
All that to say, whether you’re nodding ‘dayum’ in admiration or ‘dayum’ in bewilderment this 4th of July, let’s all at least declare ‘dayum’ together.
 | Managing Editor Jeremy Dicker |
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🌭 This is our last briefing of the week but we’ll be back Monday!
Number of the day
45
That’s how many Japanese firms reportedly went bankrupt due to a weak yen during the first half of 2026, up 30% YoY. A weaker currency makes imports pricier.
Happy 4th.
While US Intriguers stock up on hot dogs and freedom ahead of this weekend’s historic 4th of July celebrations, we figured we’d moon-walk into the weekend reflecting on how the US is doing on its 250th birthday. Let’s run through some numbers, starting with…
💪 39%
That’s the US share of global military spending, a figure virtually unchanged since 2001. It’s still so large, in fact, it single-handedly eclipses the next five countries… combined!
Those 700 installations in ~80 countries aren’t just glamour muscles either: we’ve seen ~500 US interventions over a quarter millennium — some good (defeat actual WWII Nazis), some disastrous (Iraq 2.0), and some that should’ve happened but didn’t (Rwanda).
And while the resulting post-WWII Pax Americana was never going to be perfect, darnit, it’s still the closest humanity has gotten to achieving escape velocity from our world’s default state of anarchy, delivering the longest modern run of prosperity and great-power peace, plus tidy lil’ texts like… the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
(If you sensed a ‘but’ coming, congrats on your spidey senses.) But things are changing…
First, the gap is narrowing: while US defence spending was 6x China’s a decade ago, that gap has now since halved (with some capabilities at parity or beyond)
Second, the will is waning: with doubts around Pax Americana’s ROI, 40% of folks now prefer to “stay out of world affairs” altogether
Third, the ledger is straining: net interest on national US debt has been exceeding US defence spending since 2024, with a gap that’s widening, and…
Fourth, the effectiveness is evolving: just ask Venezuela’s Maduro on the one hand (yeeted from his bed) or Iran’s mullahs on the other (still in power).
So okay, there are some aches and pains, but the US still has impressive biceps, triceps, and quadriceps. And you can only spend that much time in the gym if you’ve also got…
💵 26%
That’s America’s share of world GDP, down slightly from its 30% peak in 2000, and yet somehow still the same as the early 90s when the Soviets collapsed and China was waking.
Dig deeper and you’ll also see the greenback dominates ~60% of global reserves, 88% of trade, and it even pegs 66 other currencies, while two US networks (Visa/Mastercard) run 70% of all credit card transactions and should really advertise with Intrigue (call us 🤙).
But (there’s that word again) productivity growth is now at its slowest sustained pace since the 70s*, and inequality is now at levels not seen since the 1920s.
So okay, there’s a slight wheeze. Then what about our most important organ (the other one)…
🧠 7
That’s how many of the world’s top 10 universities are still in the US, which still wins the most Nobel Prizes in sciences and economics. Throw in 50%+ of the world’s venture capital to back the best ideas, and you’ve got a brain still doing sudoku during take-off.
But (what the heck man, c’mon) K-12 outcomes still lag most other advanced nations, public trust in those fancy colleges is eroding amid polarization, China has eclipsed the rest of the world in science publications, and that pipeline of foreign STEM talent is showing strain (international grad student enrolments just dropped ~12% in a year).
*Plus there’s this perennial asterisk around AI, where the US dominates across market cap (70%), private investment (70%), and frontier patents (60%), and might be on the cusp of reviving the productivity growth we flagged above — there are trillions riding on that.
But you can also flip those stats and marvel at the fact China is only a few months behind at a fraction of the cost, with an attitude towards AI that seems twice as optimistic.
Then let’s wrap this up in Intrigue’s favourite home-turf…
👫 2nd
That’s where Lowy’s Global Diplomacy Index now ranks the US, as DC trims its diplomatic footprint from a 2017 peak of 274 missions down to ~271 today — sure, a very modest trim, though enough to lose the top spot to an expanding China.
The more meaningful numbers are probably in the details, with a ~20% drop in foreign service officers since their 2023 peak, and ambassadorial vacancies now at a record ~55%.
Now by all means cut costs and streamline bureaucracy, but when you leave the field, rivals keep scoring. And maybe when you threaten to yoink allied territory, that’s an own goal? Some US allies tell pollsters they now find China more dependable than the US.
Anyway, all that to say at 250 years, the US still has strong ‘ceps, steady lungs, a sharp mind, deep pockets, and longstanding (if now wary) partners.
But there are some warnings flashing on the dash. And if the position of US surgeon-general wasn’t still vacant, the ol’ doc would probably highlight research that one of the best things you can do to boost your longevity is to have lots of friends.
Intrigue’s Take
Arguably the best book about the Spanish civil war is titled (funnily enough) The Spanish Civil War, by British historian Hugh Thomas. It’s full of insights and quotables, including a poignant moment just as…
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Intrigue’s Take
Arguably the best book about the Spanish civil war is titled (funnily enough) The Spanish Civil War, by British historian Hugh Thomas. It’s full of insights and quotables, including a poignant moment just as 1930s Spain starts to succumb to its own various centrifugal forces, and one of the protagonists tries to appeal to a common unity — he declares that, high above any monarchy or republic… there soars Spain.
You’ll forgive this team of ex-diplomats, determined as we are to allow you your own fix of US partisanship elsewhere, when we merely note that high above any Republican or Democrat… there soars America. And as old as 250 years sounds, including in the relatively young history of modern nation states, it’s still pretty spritely by the standards of political theory: that 250 years barely covers the lifespan of (say) four US presidents.
Also, as divided and anxious as things may feel, those feelings are hardly new: war, assassinations, tech disruption, an oil crisis, and riots? That was called the 70s. The republic has also survived actual civil war (620k dead), not just edgy tweets.
So at 250, America isn’t perfect, and it (mostly) knows it. But few political systems have delivered more prosperity, innovation, and (critically) course correction in a quarter millennium. Yes the aches are real, the friends are wary, the future is unclear, and Intrigue is unusually cheesy today, but go eat a hot dog and touch some grass, because high above the tweets and agitators, there soars America. The experiment continues.
Sound even smarter:
59% of Americans think their country’s best days are behind them.
Almost half of Americans believe China has already surpassed the US or will do so in the next five years.
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Meanwhile, elsewhere…
🇺🇦 UKRAINE — Putin attacks cities again.
As we foreshadowed, Putin has responded to Ukraine’s counter-attacks on his energy infrastructure by launching another night-time strike on Ukraine’s capital, with hits on various apartment buildings leaving at least 13 dead. (CBS)
Comment: It’s one of Putin’s largest such attacks on Ukraine since the early months of Putin’s war — it didn’t work then, and is even less likely to work now with momentum seemingly turning back against the aggressor.
🇸🇾 SYRIA — New parliament takes shape.
The interim president (al-Sharaa) has named the final 70 members of Syria’s new post-Assad parliament, paving the way for its inaugural session next week. (BBC)
Comment: That ‘named’ verb there is important — October’s regional electoral colleges selected two-thirds of the new People’s Assembly, including only six women and 10 minorities. So al-Sharaa (who has disavowed his Al Qaeda past) has always said he’d use his 70 captain’s picks to rebalance things, though the ethno-religious make-up of his new list is unclear.
🇸🇬 SINGAPORE — Another Nvidia smuggling raid.
Police have arrested four and seized ~$42M in luxury property and bank accounts in relation to the alleged smuggling of Nvidia’s advanced AI chips to China. (CNA)
Comment: Notwithstanding claims it’s all local-led, the timing (a day after similar raids in Taiwan) hints at a coordinated US effort to close tech leakage to China. And the method (asset seizures) suggests authorities are going after the financial incentives, not just the middlemen. While we’re on AI, it’s worth a look at a) the CNBC interview with Palantir’s Alex Karp, scorching frontier AI’s business model as selling tokens that “create no value”, and b) breaking reports DC might end up with a 5% stake in OpenAI to better share the benefits of the AI boom.
🇧🇷 BRAZIL — TikTok’s big bet.
China-based parent company ByteDance has chosen Brazil for its largest data centre outside China, in a major $39B expansion that’ll serve one of its top markets while helping comply with evolving data localisation laws. (Bloomberg $)
Comment: Brazil is emerging as a key battleground in the global tech-data sovereignty fight, with ByteDance realistically seeing it as a hedge amid US/China tensions.
🇿🇦 SOUTH AFRICA — Mass arrests amid anti-migrant protests.
Police have arrested some 900 locals during days of nationwide anti-migrant protests that’ve spilled over into unrest and looting in parts. A coalition of 20 civil society groups had organised the demonstrations to mark their own deadline for undocumented migrants (mostly from across Africa) to leave. (Al Jazeera)
Comment: This all continues to wedge South African authorities between an increasingly mainstream local sentiment around jobs and services, versus neighbouring nations incensed at the treatment of their nationals.
🇮🇳 INDIA — Delhi goes WFH.
City of Delhi authorities have ordered half of all government and business staff to work from home every winter (Nov to Feb) as part of new measures to tackle the capital’s notorious toxic smog. (Hindustan Times)
Comment: It’s one of the most ambitious WFH mandates any major city has tried, though makes theoretical sense for a problem that’s become both seasonal and structural. The real test will be whether companies actually comply.
Extra Intrigue
Some (long) weekend recommendations from Team Intrigue
Read: The Smithsonian has curated a collection of 250 objects to mark America’s 250th anniversary. Scroll through the stories behind 10 select artefacts from US history.
Play: Try your hand at ‘Murdoku’, a mix of Cluedo with sudoku rules.
Listen: To Deep Purple’s 24th studio album, SPLAT!
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Comedian of the day
China-born comedian Chizi. Credits: YouTube
Imagine a stand-up comedian who reaches the absolute tippy top: hit TV show, millions of followers, serious kwan. Then one day, he quits, giving away copies of the constitution (with free-speech bits highlighted) before disappearing from the internet altogether.
Well that wild story actually happened in… China! And if you now search him there (Wang Yuechi, or Chizi) it’ll come back blank: the star has become a ghost in his own country.
He’d already tested China’s increasingly trigger-happy censors — forced to cover his dreads, or blocked from wearing Nikes amid the US firm’s Xinjiang cotton stance. But the real reason he’s now banned from performing at home? Jokes he told in the US!
As Chizi plans another tour abroad, three things that grabbed us from his story…
Creativity thrives off limits: some of Chizi’s best jokes involve, say, referring to Xi Jinping elliptically as “Peng Liyuan’s husband” (per the famous first lady)
Community transcends limits: Chizi keeps selling out spicy shows among the exact diaspora Beijing wants to shape, whether via pliant outlets or policing. Yet…
Control has limits, too: Chizi has become so famous abroad, precisely because the Party tried to silence him at home. It’s vintage Streisand, transnational edition.
Today’s poll
How do you feel about America's future?
Yesterday’s poll: When do you think Putin's reign will end?
⏳ This year (12%)
📅 Next year (30%)
🥱 No time soon (56%)
✍️ Other (2%)
Your two cents:
🥱 J.L: “There's no real alternative at the moment, and it takes a while for something like that to get organized.”
📅 A.A: “This war will end Putin.”
✍️ R.C.O: “A personalist dictator's end is impossible to predict. As we've seen with Gaddafi, Assad, Maduro, and others, they are firmly in charge until they're not.”
PS — Shout-out to Insider Ajeet who coined yesterday’s ‘Putin out fires’ title 😄. Become an Insider and join the group chat today!