[Ed Feulner] Cost of waiting to drain the swamp is high

"Drain the swamp!" It was the battle cry of Donald Trump’s presidential campaign.Many Republican members of the US Congress echoed that call as well, riding it to victory -- and control of both legislative chambers.The American people rallied around the cry because it reinforced their impression of what Washington had become: a swamp infested with special interest groups and power-hungry bureaucrats.They rallied, too, because it held the promise of getting our country back on track -- by reformi

July 2, 2017

[Other view] ‘Clean Coal’ will always be a fantasy

"Clean coal," always dubious as a concept and never proved as a reality, has now failed as business proposition. Southern Co. has decided to stop work on a process that would have captured carbon dioxide emissions from a coal plant in Mississippi.Giving up on the project, which was nearly $5 billion over budget and three years behind schedule, makes sense for Southern‘s customers and shareholders. And giving up on carbon capture makes sense for the energy industry. The technology is too expensiv

July 2, 2017

[David Ignatius] Is war between China and US inevitable?

Let’s imagine a Chinese “applied history” project, similar to the one at Harvard’s Belfer Center that helped spawn professor Graham Allison’s widely discussed book “Destined for War.”Allison’s historical analysis led him to posit a “Thucydides Trap” and the danger (if not inevitability) of war between a rising China and a dominant America, like the ancient conflict between Athens and Sparta chronicled by the Greek historian Thucydides. A study by the Belfer Center’s Applied History Project ident

June 30, 2017

[David Ignatius] The global politics of selfishness

Here in the capital of Iraqi Kuridstan, the mood is “Kurdistan First” with the announcement of a referendum on independence in September. In neighboring Saudi Arabia, it‘s “Saudi First,” as a brash young crown prince steers the kingdom toward a more assertive role in the region. In Moscow, where I visited a few weeks ago, it’s “Russia First,” with a vengeance. And so it goes, around most of the world.The politics of national self-interest is on steroids these days. For global leaders, it‘s the “

June 29, 2017

[Kai Bird] When ‘October surprise’ conspiracies come true

We Americans love conspiracies. They are like good spy stories: entertaining, intriguing and tantalizing. But historians learn to hate conspiracy stories. The evidence is often circular, circumstantial and infuriatingly slippery. And usually, the simplest explanation — not the conspiracy theory — turns out to be the best.In my first biography, “The Chairman: John J. McCloy and the Making of the American Establishment,” about the influential Wall Street lawyer and perennial presidential advisor,

June 29, 2017

[The Baltimore Sun] Trump’s Russian reversal

President Donald Trump’s inconsistency may be his only consistency, but even by the standard he’s set for abrupt reversals during his first five months in office, the president’s recent proclamations on election meddling raise hypocrisy to nose-bleed heights. Lest we bury the lead, here’s the real upshot: for the first time, Trump has acknowledged Russian interference in the last election and is none too happy about it.What could have motivated the nation’s commander in chief to finally admit to

June 29, 2017

[Other view] India as ally: US ties with Modi make good balance with China

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi visited Washington and met with President Donald Trump on Monday. It is easy to see why the president is paying attention to this Indian leader. He is clearly in the same league of world leaders as China’s Xi Jinping; Russia’s Vladimir Putin, whom Trump has not yet met with as president; Turkey’s Recep Tayyip Erdogan; and Germany’s Angela Merkel.Indian-American economic and commercial involvement is plain to see, although Trump’s emphasis on trying to sell Ind

June 29, 2017

[Other view] NATO can fight terrorism and help refugees

The North Atlantic Treaty Organization has now formally enlisted in the fight against the Islamic State group. It can begin by helping to stem the flow of refugees trying to reach Europe from North Africa.This would be more than a humanitarian exercise; it would be a counterterrorism operation. Wherever refugees gather in hopelessness, violent extremists have a fertile recruiting ground. And the number of refugees is staggering.Nearly 200,000 people fleeing violence and poverty tried to cross th

June 28, 2017

[Mihir Sharma] Tax reform looks like an Indian wedding

India stands on the brink of one of its most momentous policy reforms in decades unprepared and uncertain. We’re just a few days away from the launch of a new indirect-tax regime, the goods-and-services tax, or GST, and anxiety about its rollout is all-pervasive.The reform, which intends to knit India together into a single tax area for the first time, goes live on July 1 -- in fact, at the stroke of midnight. The Narendra Modi-led central government, always on the lookout for a bit of spectacle

June 28, 2017

[The Baltimore Sun] The Supreme Court’s uneasy compromise on Trump’s travel ban

President Donald Trump called the Supreme Court’s decision to hear cases related to his ban on travel from six Muslim nations and to allow it to go into partial effect in the meantime “a clear victory.” But there’s nothing clear about it, either for his administration or for those who could be affected by it. Rather, it is reminiscent of other baby-splitting decisions by the Roberts court in politically tricky cases, and it is difficult to see what it portends either in the weeks ahead or after

June 28, 2017

[Tyler Cowen] Populism’s success, in plain English

Populist and “alt-right” causes have lately seen some setbacks, including the centrist electoral results in the Netherlands, the victory of Emmanuel Macron and his party in France, the poor showing of the Five Star Movement in local Italian elections and the split of the True Finns party in Finland. Yet the US election of Donald Trump and the vote for Brexit remain, at least so far, and so a new question arises: Are these political movements primarily an Anglo-American phenomenon, and if so why?

June 27, 2017

[Leonid Bershidsky] Macron can follow Germany’s lead on labor reform

The German economy is in a remarkably rosy phase. According to data published on Monday by the Ifo Institute, business confidence is at a record high since 1991. The Bundesbank has raised its growth forecasts through 2019. One of the reasons for this surge of optimism is that the German labor market is performing well. At 3.9 percent, the unemployment rate is lower than it has been since the country’s reunification.It‘s often said that to achieve the same kind of economic buoyancy, France needs

June 27, 2017

[Trudy Rubin] Trump’s failing ‘big man doctrine’

King Salman of Saudi Arabia just elevated his somewhat reckless 31-year-old son Prince Mohammed to become crown prince, and the White House is thrilled.The prince has bonded with Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner, hosting him and Ivanka Trump for dinner at his home when the pair traveled with the president to Saudi Arabia. The closeness of these two “princes” syncs perfectly with the emerging Trump doctrine of foreign policy.Call it the “big man doctrine.”Based on his performance over five months

June 27, 2017