Welcome to Vox Sentences, our news bulletin breaking down the day's biggest stories.
1. An even greater firewall
A person surfs the internet in a net cafe on January 21, 2008 in Chongqing Municipality, China. (China Photos/Getty Images)
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China has initiated a crackdown on the use of Virtual Private Networks (VPNs), a technology widely used to evade the country's extensive internet censorship.
[NYT / Andrew Jacobs]
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An official at the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology confirmed the crackdown to People's Daily, a government paper.
[People's Daily]
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Over the past month or so, a variety of Western sites — like Gmail, Instagram, and Flickr — have been blocked as well.
[Washington Post / Simon Denyer]
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In addition to the blockages, there have also been hacks, like one targeting Microsoft Outlook, which the Chinese government is widely suspected of carrying out.
[The Verge / Russell Brandom]
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The internet restrictions aren't just a form of censorship; they're also a kind of protectionism, sheltering Chinese businesses like Baidu and Alibaba from competition by US tech companies.
[WSJ / Te-Ping Chen]
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In 2008, many observers were insisting China would never crack down on VPNs: "Every bank, every foreign manufacturing company, every retailer, every software vendor needs VPNs to exist," one professor said.
[The Atlantic / James Fallows]
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Besides hurting businesses, the VPN crackdown is making life very difficult for Chinese scientists trying to work with their Western colleagues.
[NYT / Andrew Jacobs]
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It's worth noting this is not as severe as a 2012 incident in which VPN services were blocked almost entirely; the fact that they were later restored gives some cause for optimism now.
[Washington Post / Simon Denyer]
2. Licensed to Ill
The more tightly regulated this hygienist's job is, the more teeth she's going to have to take from poor Janet here. (Shutterstock)
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President Obama's budget will contain $15 million for state and local governments to evaluate their occupational licensing rules.
[NYT / Eduardo Porter]
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The number of jobs that require a license has grown considerably in recent decades, often in baffling fields; as of 2012, 39 states required licensing for massage therapists and 34 states required a license to install security alarms.
[Vox / Tim Lee]
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As of 2008, 29 percent of workers had a government license for their job.
[Journal of Labor Economics / Morris Kleiner and Alan Krueger]
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Licensing increases wages considerably, but hurts consumers by raising prices; one study found that people in states where dental hygienists are tightly regulated are more likely to lose teeth to decay or gum disease.
[Vox / James Bessen]
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By one estimate, licensing costs consumers $208 billion a year, and cuts employment by 2.85 million.
[Upjohn Institute / Morris Kleiner]
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Obama's budget isn't out until Monday, but this paper by the University of Minnesota's Morris Kleiner, the leading economist on licensing issues, illustrates what this kind of reform would look like.
[Hamilton Project / Morris Kleiner]
3. Keystonewalled no more
Protesters are led away after disrupting the US Senate vote on the Keystone XL Pipeline Bill. (Win McNamee/Getty Images)
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The Senate has passed a bill approving construction of the Keystone XL oil pipeline.
[NYT / Coral Davenport]
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The vote was 62 to 36, which is five votes short of a veto-proof majority. And Obama has promised he'll veto this.
[Vox / Brad Plumer]
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The House has already passed the bill, but also fell short of a veto-proof margin.
[Washington Post / Lori Montgomery and Steven Mufson]
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While Obama has been clear that he doesn't want Congress forcing his hand, he hasn't said whether he'll approve the pipeline.
[AP / Josh Lederman]
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Environmentalists fear that approving the pipeline would accelerate the burning of high-carbon tar sands oil, causing worse global warming. That might be true, but it's hard to say how big a deal it is.
[Vox / Brad Plumer]
4. Misc.
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"Chinese officers caught feasting on an endangered salamander" is the greatest headline of our times.
[Washington Post / William Wan and Gu Jinglu]
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We have drugs that can dramatically cut heroin overdoses and help people end their addictions. And few people are able to get them.
[Huffington Post / Jason Cherkis]
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According to one study, surgeons left objects (usually sponges) inside patients 4,857 times from 1990 to 2010. They operated on the wrong patient altogether 27 times.
[Vox / Sarah Kliff]
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Here are three concrete things that the NFL can do to make concussions and brain damage less common.
[The Atlantic / Jeff Nussbaum]
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Political nerds love talking about brokered conventions because they're really fun and chaotic and haven't happened in decades, but Sean Trende makes a good case that Republicans could face one next year.
[RealClearPolitics / Sean Trende]
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Anti-vaxxers didn't cause the 2014 measles outbreak. An Amish missionary did.
[Vox / Julia Belluz]
5. Verbatim
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"A couple who named their child 'Nutella' are now the proud parents of baby 'Ella' after a French court rejected their decision to name the child after the delicious hazelnut spread."
[Washington Post / Abby Ohlheiser]
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"If you’re looking for people to join your insanely dangerous and lucrative bombing spree, there are worse places to recruit than Liverpool."
[Bloomberg / Nick Summers]
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"Muslim countries average 2.4 murders per annum per 100,000 people, compared to 7.5 in non-Muslim countries."
[Washington Post / Steven Fish]
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"It makes you feel like a lobster, just like, ready to be declawed."
[Barbara Kavovit to New York Post / Dana Schuster]
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"Binge-watching a TV show on Netflix or Hulu is one of the great pleasures of modern life, but now a study from the University of Texas at Austin is going to make you feel weird about it."
[NY Mag / Melissa Dahl]
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- Vox Sentences: China's cracking down on VPNs. That's a BFD.
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