Communist China's protracted COVID-19 lockdowns have constrained its international economic reach, according to a new report by Derek Scissors using data from his China Global Investment Tracker. Chinese firms' disclosures, Scissors finds, contradict their regime's claims of robust economic activity worldwide.

Writing in National Review, Yuval Levin reviews The Rise of the New Puritans: Fighting Back Against Progressives' War on Fun by Noah Rothman (Broadside Books, 2022). Levin writes that Rothman "has finally made sense of" the fanatical zeal found among "the woke Left. It is, he notes, a form of Puritanism, for good and bad."

Highlighting similarities between France and America's political systems, Philip Wallach considers how the recent shifts in French electoral politics—especially the rise of Emmanuel Macron and the fall of a long-established party system—could prefigure a similar sea change in our country.

In a long-read Q&A, James Pethoukoukis asks Michael R. Strain, "Are we in the post-pandemic economy?" Their discussion starts on inflation and covers a range of economic problems that affect Americans and confound our policymakers.

Michael Rubin warns that congressional Democrats' intention to block "commonsense" sanctions on Iran will strengthen the country's abusive and Russian-aligned regime. "By increasing public executions while feigning outreach to the West," Rubin contends, "the Iranian leadership signals that reform is for external consumption only and that ordinary Iranians should have no such illusions."

On the latest episode of AEI's Banter podcast, Adam J. White discusses this past year's Supreme Court term and its most controversial decisions with AEI President Robert Doar and cohost Phoebe Keller. They tackle the dissent in Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization and the slight but significant differences between Chevron deference and the major questions doctrine behind the Court's decision in West Virginia v. Environmental Protection Agency.