US computer chip giant Intel is to invest close to $6 billion in upgrading its Israeli production facilities, Israeli Economy Minister Naftali Bennett said on Thursday.

Legislation to restructure the organization overseeing the government-funded media outlet Voice of America advanced in the House this week, a measure that proponents say would bring it closer in line with U.S. policy but critics fear could turn the storied news service into a a propaganda tool.

Manifestoes about U.S. “decline,” have become a publishing juggernaut. But this literature is demolished in a beautifully written, persuasive new book from Bruce Jones, the Brookings Institution senior fellow. In Still Ours to Lead: America, Rising Powers, and the Tension between Rivalry and Restraint, Jones explains that the declinists have it all wrong. 

The US Department of State is transitioning into a digital context and public diplomacy is evolving in the process. Michael Ardaiolo discusses the U.S. public diplomacy’s shift toward a digital world with Dr. Craig Hayden.

I had to laugh when I heard about the U.S. Agency for International Development’s botched effort to create a Twitter-like platform for Cuba intended to undermine the communist regime. Even the name — ZunZuneo — to the State Department’s credit, sounded like something cooked up in Silicon Valley, not Foggy Bottom.

A generation ago, Canada was perceived to be an exemplary global citizen by the rest of the world: it took the lead on a host of international issues, including the Convention of Child Rights, freedom of information, acid rain, world peacekeeping, sanctions against South Africa's apartheid regime, and humanitarian and development assistance—much of this under conservative leadership.

BBG Watch has learned that a draft bill originating in the House Foreign Affairs Committee, which has U.S. Rep. Ed Royce (R-CA) as Chairman and U.S. Rep. Eliot Engel (D-NY) as Ranking Member, would, if passed by Congress and signed by the President, radically reform the Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG), an agency currently in charge of U.S. international media outreach.