Crunch time for Xi Jinping

Enjoying this newsletter? Get it in your inbox every weekend, as well as our daily round-up of The Economist’s best journalism, by signing up for free here.

Hello from London,

We first mentioned “Super Tuesday” in our pages in 1980, when we judged that Jimmy Carter, the incumbent, had managed only a “hollow victory” in his party’s contest. He went on to lose in November—the last time a Democratic president served just one term. Joe Biden is desperate to avoid the same fate.

No doubt both he and Donald Trump will easily win their various primary contests on not-so-super Tuesday this week. This primary race lacks the fizz of excitement typical of most presidential-election years. Mr Biden saw a lot of protest votes in Michigan, related to the war in Gaza. Mr Trump—in effect the incumbent in his own party—is unhappy that Nikki Haley has not yet quit. (May she hang around longer.) Probably the more important moment for the president comes later in the week, at the State of the Union address. It’s less about what he says than about how much vigour and vim he shows in delivering it. 

If you’re a history enthusiast, here’s a treat: we’ve launched a new weekend quiz, Dateline, based on five snippets from our 181-year-old archive. Your challenge is to pick the date each was published. We’d love to get feedback from you as we work to improve it. Try Dateline and compete to be crowned a modern-day Herodotus.

Yesterday our sister publication, 1843 magazine, published an in-depth reporting piece from Florida. The Sunshine State has shifted sharply to the right since Barack Obama narrowly carried it in 2012. As my colleague Robert Guest reports, Florida has become the place where people go when they are fed up with wokeness.

In Britain the week is likely to be dominated by Wednesday’s budget. Will the government find a way to cut taxes? Conservative voters (and MPs) are clamouring for that. But given the rotten state of public services and high levels of debt, the government would be foolish to do so. The Conservatives risk losing what little credibility they retain as economic managers. My colleagues will be analysing it all in the days ahead. 

The backdrop, naturally, is the looming election in Britain. You can explore our new “Build a voter” tool, for studying the British electorate, that helps to reveal just how hard it will be for the Conservatives to find a path to victory in 2024.

Xi Jinping doesn’t have to worry about anything as inconvenient as a competitive election in China. But even an autocrat has to change course—on economic or other policies—when things are not going to plan, as now. Read our new assessment of Mr Xi’s efforts to reset.

We have also published our latest Schumpeter column, on Apple. Our columnist argues that the tech company is right not to rush headlong into generative AI, despite accusations that it has been too slow to react. Schumpeter is reminded of the words of one Apple executive in 2013, another time the company faced existential questions: “Can’t innovate anymore, my ass!”

Finally, we’ve published our latest Bartleby column on the merits (within reason) of losing your temper at work. Related, I provoked a few angry outbursts from some readers last week who objected to my comments on rule by the elderly. Most interesting to me were the thoughtful comments from many of you. Some of you countered with your own examples: a young autocrat in El Salvador (Nayib Bukele, 42), or the elderly ranks of Japan’s democratic government. Lourenço Noronha, who wrote from Jakarta, Indonesia, is surely right to observe there is no “clear correlation between the health of a democracy and the age of the leaders”. But as autocrats tend to hang around in office, they may push up the age of those in charge of badly run places.

A final thanks to Yves Christian Wyser-Pratte for a heartfelt short note. He writes that he was “born in fascist France in 1944 under the Nazi jackboot and came to the USA on a Victory ship in 1946.” He says he is now disturbed by political trends and hostility to foreigners in his adopted home, especially after a Trump-supporting (ex-)friend commented that “Once he’s elected carry your papers with you.” Mr Wyser-Pratte says: “I still have my papers issued by the collaborationist Vichy government to an infant. Looking at them makes me sick.”  

Send me your views at economisttoday@economist.com.

Adam Roberts, Digital editor

Recommended reads

Crunch time for Xi Jinping at China’s annual political meeting

How do you reset the world’s conversation about a country that is in trouble? That is the task facing China’s embattled leadership this week, during what will be the most important public-facing political event of the year. China’s legislature, the National People’s Congress, is a rubber-stamp affair, but its annual session provides a rare window onto what the Communist Party is thinking. This year’s gathering will begin on March 5th with a state-of-the-nation speech from Li Qiang, the prime minister, and will end one week later. 

Tired of wokeness? Move to Florida

Florida is where people go when they are fed up with wokeness. Nearly two-thirds of Floridians moved there from somewhere else; a fifth were born abroad. They come for many reasons, from the weather to the absence of a state income tax. But disillusion with the way their home states (or home countries) are governed plays an important role.

Why you should lose your temper at work

Has Barry from HR really been pushing your buttons and you need to vent? In the workplace, as elsewhere, anger is more ambiguous than it seems. A short-fused boss is likely to instil fear among employees and to discourage people from speaking up. But getting angry also has its uses. 

Most read by subscribers this week

• The obesity capitals of the world
• A golden age for stockmarkets is drawing to a close
• Apple is right not to rush headlong into generative AI
• America’s ten-year-old fentanyl epidemic is still getting worse
• How businesses are actually using generative AI

Get full access to our journalism

Read three free articles each month on Economist.com—register for free. If you are not a subscriber, enjoy full access by subscribing here.