Natalia Cote-Muñoz 柯曼雅

Mexilombian-American. PRC, LatAm, Asia-Pacific. Fmr. #Team46 @StateDept @SubnationalDip. Personal Account. Views=mine. RT,L,F≠E

[Brian Hioe 丘琦欣 @brianhioe]

This is key to note about United Front efforts—they are often bureaucratic, ineffective, and simply done in order to meet KPIs

[Joseph Torigian @JosephTorigian]

This week is the 37th anniversary of the June 4 crackdown in Beijing.

We had a big development in the available evidence on the violence since last year: the trial video of General Xu Qinxian leaked.

I wrote about the video for @WarOnTheRocks here:

https://t.co/hQ3o0WmwbE

[Joseph Torigian @JosephTorigian]

I'll also be on a panel on China's global ambitions with Evan Medeiros and @ncotemunoz, moderated by Javier Tello, at the @UCSD US-Mexico Forum

https://t.co/ijXjmCTMHS

[Arnaud Bertrand @RnaudBertrand]

Venezuela killed the US. Or rather, it revealed it was already dead.

In the history of the US’s relation with Latin America, what just happened in Venezuela is hardly unique: the U.S. government has intervened to change governments in Latin America a total of 41 times (https://t.co/3CDBc7fbez).

What is unprecedented however is the brazenness, the unabashedly predatory nature of the intervention.

Trump is not pretending this is about anything else than resource extraction. He explicitly stated "we're going to be taking out a tremendous amount of wealth out of the ground" and that this wealth would “go to the United States of America in the form of reimbursement for the damages caused us by that country." (https://t.co/5ZVibGjEBd).

Stunningly, the US isn’t even insisting on regime change. They’re quite happy for the Chavista government to stay in place under acting president Delcy Rodríguez as long as she “does what we want,” (said Trump: https://t.co/Mm8rSftT1f), vowing to bomb the country again if she didn’t.

In other words, there is absolutely zero pretense there: submission to the U.S.’s will is the only variable that matters.

Never before in its entire history has the U.S. been so nakedly… bad.

This might sound almost trivial. “So what if they admit they’re bad, at least they’re not hypocritical about it anymore,” you might tell yourself. Some might even find that refreshing in its honesty.

Quite the contrary. The story a nation tells itself is not trivial - it is everything.

We, human beings, for better or worse, are structured by mythology and self-deception.

Think about yourself, what drives your own behavior? You have, doubtlessly, ideals you want to live up to. If you have kids you have ideals of what a good parent ought to be. If you have a spouse you have ideals of what fidelity and partnership mean. If you have a job you have some conception of integrity.

You probably fall short - we all do - but the ideals still structure your behavior. They give you something to reach for, they provide the terms in which you can be criticized - including by your own internal dialogue. They make it possible for you to do better tomorrow.

The hypocrisy - the gap between ideal and reality - is not the problem. It's the proof that the ideal still has a hold on you, that you can still be called back to it. As the saying goes, hypocrisy is the tribute vice pays to virtue.

Now imagine you renounce all this. Imagine you stop being a hypocrite in the sense that you abandon your ideals entirely, that you start owning up to your worst self and become comfortable with your vices. You cheat on your spouse and stop pretending it bothers you. You neglect your children and make peace with it.

Have you thus become “refreshingly honest”? Maybe. But you’ve also died inside. You’ve become something deeply broken - beyond shame, beyond appeal. You’ve lost the internal architecture that makes moral life possible. The little light that said “this is not who I want to be” is extinguished.

That is what the United States just did.

The consequences of this are, frankly, terrifying. What happens when a nation stops telling itself it should be good? This is precisely what I try to answer in my latest article: https://t.co/KNoPdy028H

[Tony Martin @mrtonymartin]

I'm seriously starting to question the credibility of the FIFA Peace Prize.

[Gideon Rachman @gideonrachman]

So when China launches a special
op to seize the president of Taiwan: or Russia tries to do the same for Zelensky - what exactly do we say? You can’t do that, it’s illegal?

[Natalia Cote-Muñoz 柯曼雅 @ncotemunoz]

brat summer. berghain winter.

[Natalia Cote-Muñoz 柯曼雅 @ncotemunoz]

Completed my día de los muertos labubu 💕

[National Committee on U.S.-China Relations @NCUSCR]

Are Labubus the new face of “Made in China”?

Natalia Cote-Muñoz (@ncotemunoz)(CEO, Vantage Point Strategies) joins us to share how Labubus are resonating across different cultures and changing the way people perceive China.

▶️ Watch: https://t.co/u6HCDENElw

[Crazy Ass Moments in LatAm Politics @AssLatam]

When announcing President Gustavo Petro of Colombia had his visa revoked, the US Department of State initially tagged a brazilian journalist (Gustavo Petró) instead of him.

[Natalia Cote-Muñoz 柯曼雅 @ncotemunoz]

My latest for @AmerQuarterly

[Americas Quarterly @AmerQuarterly]

As cities deploy artificial intelligence at a breakneck speed, they face a fundamental choice: Will AI enhance democratic governance or digitize authoritarian control?
https://t.co/ko2yI8iIzn

[Natalia Cote-Muñoz 柯曼雅 @ncotemunoz]

In about 1000 years there will be a toxic type of bro obsessed with the “American Empire” and its fall.

One of their integrated AI microchips will be full of just facts from the past 6+ months

Imagine going on a date with this guy and him mansplaining “Jimmy Kimmel” to you

[Natalia Cote-Muñoz 柯曼雅 @ncotemunoz]

Effective AI writing assistance doesn't involve AI writing for you.

When I was concussed, I experimented with AI to support my writing while keeping my voice.

My latest piece breaks down the workflows that worked.

https://t.co/IwI9rFks1d

[Paradiplomacia.org @Paradiplomacia]

🚀 Today we launch “The Paradiplomacy Worldwide”. A new edition of the #TIPJournal
One global community building knowledge on #paradiplomacy 🌐.
Special issue co-edited with @unilodz
📘 Theoretical vol.: https://t.co/s9FYGHBO7U
📙 Practical vol.: https://t.co/YufrFhy1fs

[Natalia Cote-Muñoz 柯曼雅 @ncotemunoz]

Washington DC right now like: I’m at the ICE raid. I’m at the FBI stop. I’m at the combination National Guard-Metropolitan Police Department-ATF-DEA-U.S. Marshall-Park Police-FBI-ICE raid stop checkpoint.

[Natalia Cote-Muñoz 柯曼雅 @ncotemunoz]

A friend in Beijing had a Labubu on his briefcase before a client meeting. When advised to put it away: “Trust me.”
Client: “Nice Labubu! Hard to get and expensive. Business must be going well.”
Here I explore “cuteness” as a strategic asset in my latest: https://t.co/kIbkLtRLXs

[Natalia Cote-Muñoz 柯曼雅 @ncotemunoz]

@jengolbeck Haha aw 💕

[Natalia Cote-Muñoz 柯曼雅 @ncotemunoz]

Washington DC right now like: I’m at the ICE raid. I’m at the FBI stop. I’m at the combination National Guard-Metropolitan Police Department-ATF-DEA-U.S. Marshall-Park Police-FBI-ICE raid stop checkpoint.

[Natalia Cote-Muñoz 柯曼雅 @ncotemunoz]

TL;DR: the CEO of Gumroad moonlit at DOGE, created AI slop code that slashed veterans’ benefits, talked about it openly and posted code on GitHub, got fired. The biggest story nobody is talking about here👇
https://t.co/l66d9rfLyQ

[Natalia Cote-Muñoz 柯曼雅 @ncotemunoz]

@RyanFedasiuk Lmao