[Therese Raphael] Johnson's case has echoes for Trump

When Boris Johnson announced on March 27 that he’d tested positive for COVID-19, Brits were in shock, much as Americans were Friday morning when they heard President Donald Trump was infected. The UK prime minister was the first leader of a major country to be hospitalized with the virus, an event that was characterized as “routine” at first before the illness took a more serious turn. Nobody knows how this will play out for Trump, just as they didn’t for Johnson. But th

Oct. 6, 2020

Belief in mission vital to entrepreneurs

The world as we know it has changed. I have lived through three different crises in my life. The first one was the Indonesian political turmoil in 1998 that coincided with the Asian financial crisis, and the second is when I graduated from college in the United States. Having graduated with an electrical engineering degree, I faced a job market reeling from the burst of the dot-com bubble. Even though I was lucky enough to find a job in Boston, the highlight of my second day of work was 9/11. T

Oct. 5, 2020

[Andreas Kluth] Europe can have stimulus or rule of law, not both

More by carelessness than design, the European Union has conflated two of its biggest problems into what last week became one hot mess. To get out of it, the bloc may have to make the Brussels equivalent of Sophie’s choice: It could sacrifice the principle that all member states must respect the rule of law. Or it could ditch its plans for economic recovery and fiscal cohesion. This trap was laid in July. Under the moderation of Germany, which holds the rotating EU presidency, the 27 nati

Oct. 5, 2020

[Lee Kyong-hee] A land developer’s passion for Korean script

Tourists flock to Bukchon Hanok Village, perpetuating the must-see reputation of the Seoul enclave. The small Korean-style houses lining narrow alleyways are cultural magnets, pulling in sightseers from home and abroad. Many of the residents don traditional Korean garb to perhaps recapture the backdrops of popular serials and movies shot in the neighborhood. This, of course, was before the COVID-19 pandemic froze travel and tourism. The tourist boom in Bukchon began with the first ripples of H

Sept. 30, 2020

[Kim Seong-kon] Learning from inspirational phrases on internet or in films

Recently on the internet, I came across a rather penetrating passage that says, “The American people will never knowingly adopt socialism, but under the name of liberalism, they will adopt every fragment of the socialist program until one day America will be a socialist nation without ever knowing how it happened.” At first, I thought a conservative American wrote it to warn the American people of the pervasiveness of socialism. To my surprise, the author was a renowned 19th centur

Sept. 30, 2020

[Tyler Cowen] Will pandemic normal become normal?

One feature of the COVID-19 era is how much the standard ways of seeing and doing things have been remixed and turned upside down. The obvious question is then whether people will decide to make these new arrangements permanent or return to the old. For example: I used to enjoy going to nouvelle-style slightly fancy restaurants, ordering 10 appetizers (and no main courses) and sharing them with a table of four. Many of those appetizers were composed of disparate ingredients, carefully placed on

Sept. 30, 2020

[Andreas Kluth] If we can’t ban nukes, let’s stigmatize them

There are potential catastrophes so dire, only an approach that blurs the realist and the utopian seems appropriate. Take for example the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons. Adopted by the United Nations in 2017, it seeks to completely get rid of the most satanic arms ever created. The treaty’s already been signed by 84 states and ratified by 45. To take effect -- that is, to be binding on its signatories -- it needs only another handful of ratifications. And last week a group

Sept. 29, 2020

[Trudy Rubin] Trump’s ‘big lie’ echoes autocrats

In the 1920s Adolf Hitler coined the term “the big lie,” meaning the use of falsehood so huge no one would believe a leader could dare promote it were it not true. From then on the phrase “the big lie” became a standard description of the prime propaganda technique used by strongmen in undemocratic regimes. Last week, Donald Trump’s mastery of the big lie was on full display when he gave himself an A+ for his handling of COVID-19. “We’ve done a phenom

Sept. 29, 2020

[Ana Palacio] The EU merry-go-round

In her first State of the European Union address, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen offered a wide-ranging view of the current moment. She touted Europe’s recent achievements and identified its goals for the coming years. She dedicated significant attention to the European Green Deal and the Digital Agenda, and called for the completion of the banking union and capital-market integration. In normal times, it would have been a solid, if not particularly inspiring, performan

Sept. 28, 2020

[Jan-Werner Mueller] Democrats must finally play hardball

Around the world, right-wing populists are hollowing out democracy and the rule of law. But unlike many 20th century dictators, today’s aspiring authoritarians have tried to preserve the facade of the institutions they are destroying, which creates a dilemma for opposition parties. Should they play by the rules of a game that is rigged against them, or should they start writing their own rules and risk accusations of being liberal democracy’s real gravediggers? The conventional wisd

Sept. 28, 2020

[Digital Simplicity] IU, 8K display and next-generation gaming

Last Saturday, singer IU’s newest live performance video was revealed on YouTube. It was a landmark event since the video was formatted in 8K resolution, which easily outperforms 4K display. A small number of those who purchased the prohibitively expensive and visually expansive 88-inch OLED TV from LG Electronics were lucky enough to get a glimpse of what the 8K technology could offer, thanks to the stunning image featuring IU’s equally exquisite live performance. Just in case y

Sept. 26, 2020

[Robert J. Fouser] South Korea as a Middle Power

On Monday this week, President Moon Jae-in addressed world leaders by satellite in a special event to commemorate the 75th anniversary of the United Nations. In his address, Moon focused on the multilateral efforts among the MIKTA countries -- Mexico, Indonesia, Korea, Turkey and Australia -- to address the COVID-19 pandemic and other pressing global issues. He stressed that nations and international organizations should work together to ensure that developing countries have access to COVID-19 v

Sept. 25, 2020

[Kim Myong-sik] Ruling group’s audacity invites the people’s dissent

The nation is faced with a triple crisis. The No. 1 problem, of course, is the COVID-19 pandemic, which over the past nine months has seriously transformed South Koreans’ lifestyles. Next is economic gloom, partly from the impact of the coronavirus and partly attributable to the sloppy leftist policies of the Moon Jae-in administration. And the third and worst is the credibility crisis due to the contrasting words and deeds of politicians. I call it a crisis because it has escalated to a

Sept. 24, 2020

[Ramesh Ponnuru] It’s dumb to bash the WTO

When the World Trade Organization was created in the mid-1990s, the US Senate voted 76-24 to establish it. But it is now facing more opposition than ever, and from both parties. “The World Trade Organization has been not good for the United States,” President Donald Trump said in a mid-September press conference. “It’s been good for everybody else, but it’s not been good. It was a method, in my opinion, of taking advantage of the United States.” Bob Woodward

Sept. 24, 2020

[Kim Seong-kon] 10 propositions for today’s populist leaders

Today, quite a few countries suffer from populist leaders who are tearing their nations apart by dividing people with factional brawls and crippling the economy by spending money unscrupulously to flatter the people. These populist leaders gravely degrade the integrity of their respective nations with indecent words and behavior. Consequently, some populist leaders have made their countries bankrupt already, whether spiritually or financially, and others have seriously damaged the image of their

Sept. 23, 2020

[Daoud Kuttab] The Arab betrayal of the Palestinian people

It is normal for countries with deep disagreements nonetheless to maintain diplomatic, trade and commercial relations. Yet there are also circumstances when such relations are regarded as nonstarters. That is certainly the case for most countries vis-a-vis North Korea, but it also describes America’s previous stance on Cuba, and now Venezuela, as well as Israel’s policy on Iran, Saudi Arabia’s on Qatar, and much of the Arab world’s on Israel. Given the importance of dial

Sept. 22, 2020

[Cass R. Sunstein] Ginsburg cleared path to include the excluded

It was 1985, I think. The Federalist Society was hosting a conference in Washington on equality. I was a young professor, the token liberal on a panel, and its least distinguished member. The experience was brutal. Professor Paul Bator, a famous scholar who had been my teacher not long before, was on the panel, and at one point he whispered in my ear. “Just stop talking,” he said. “No one in the room wants to hear you.” Humiliated, I retreated to my hotel room. At about

Sept. 22, 2020

[Ferdinando Giugliano] Do not force people back into office

The end of the summer holidays and the reopening of schools have sparked a lively debate over the future of remote working. From the US to the UK, politicians and employers are nudging workers to return to the office even though the pandemic is not over. But these requests put employees in a very awkward place -- caught between fearing for their health and fearing for their job. Following two key principles may resolve some of the tension. First, the government should have no say in this decisi

Sept. 21, 2020

[Chris Bryant] No revenue is no problem in 2020 stock market

Wall Street isn’t always too fussed about whether a startup is profitable before listing on the stock exchange. A decent track record of sales growth is usually pretty essential, though. That quaint idea has been turned on its head this year by the fad for special purpose acquisition companies. Called SPACs for short, they raise cash from investors in an initial public offering and then go find a company to buy. By merging with one of these cash boxes, the target gets a dollop of capital

Sept. 21, 2020

[Tomas Anker Christensen] Korea can become Asia’s green energy export hub

Korea was the first country I visited in my new capacity as Climate Ambassador last February. Denmark regards Korea as an important partner in green growth. The Korean Green New Deal cements my belief that we are heading in the same direction. It is a visionary moon-shot that can have implications for the lives of millions of people and generations to come in Korea. While Korea initiated a 73.4 trillion-won Green New Deal, this June we adopted the Danish Climate Law setting our ambitious target

Sept. 21, 2020