[Anne Michaud] Arab Spring must not leave women behind

This year’s Arab Spring uprisings against authoritarian regimes included many prominent women: There was a Tunisian blogger who was among the first to alert the world to the country’s growing turmoil. And there were demonstrators, journalists, bloggers and tweeters in Egypt who forced the February ouster of President Hosni Mubarak.But since those inspiring days, the news from this region has paint

June 12, 2011

How new is Egypt’s ‘new’ foreign policy?

CAIRO ― In the months since Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak’s resignation, his successors have signaled a shift in foreign policy by reaching out to former adversaries. Egypt’s government has welcomed Iranian diplomats and embraced the Palestinian group Hamas. Many interpret such moves as clear evidence of Egypt’s desire for a diplomacy that is not subordinate to American interests.But Mubarak ne

June 12, 2011

Taiwan voters need solid facts on nuclear power

It is easy to see how a commercial against nuclear power could influence a voter. A Taiwanese family is enjoying supper when alarms ring out. Images of people in hazmat suits fill the television screen as an announcer reports horrific events: thousands dead, millions evacuated, parts of northern Taiwan unlivable for generations. This theoretical TV spot then ends with the tagline: “Is Nuclear Powe

June 10, 2011

Germany’s nuclear-policy flip-flop may blunt its edge

Germany’s decision to abandon nuclear energy is a monumental policy shift that might threaten the competitiveness of the German industry.The country’s coalition government decided Monday to abolish all of its 17 nuclear reactors by 2022. Older nuclear reactors built before 1980, which have already been taken off the grid, will remain offline permanently. The remaining nine reactors will be phased

June 10, 2011

Naked aggression

Philippine President Aquino told reporters in Brunei last week that a military confrontation between the Philippines and China would be “no contest.” In terms of military strength, China has “a great advantage,“ he said. “Even in a boxing match, there’s one and half billion of them, (while) we are barely 100 million.”All true, of course. But stating the obvious seems totally unnecessary and counte

June 10, 2011

Chinese house price collapse rumors wishful thinking

Media reports that the prices of new homes in major Chinese cities are plummeting at double-digit rates amount to nothing more than bunkum and wishful thinking. Admittedly, shrinking sales of new apartments can be observed in most Chinese cities nowadays. But this is just a possible harbinger, not evidence, that property prices have begun to drop. China’s rocketing housing prices are so unpopular

June 10, 2011

A U.S. strategy for fighting cyberattacks

The Pentagon is developing a new cyberwarfare strategy that calls for the use of military force ― including conventional weapons ― in response to certain kinds of damaging online attacks on U.S. institutions. That’s fine in theory; if foreign agents launch a cyberattack on, say, the nation’s electrical grid, it may be both reasonable and proportionate to fire missiles at, say, the attacker’s energ

June 9, 2011

U.S. economy is being suffocated by uncertainty

The economic recovery is 2 years old this month. Isn’t that reassuring? I didn’t think so. As recoveries go, this one is as blah as it gets. Judging by the most recent indicators, we may be headed for a double dip, or perhaps a period of flatlining that feels just as bad.Job growth is sluggish and unemployment is again on the rise. In the first three months of this year, the economy slowed substan

June 9, 2011

[Fuller W. Bazer] English-only lectures

The editorial in The Korea Herald, June 7, 2011, states that “The spreading of English-only lectures in Korean universities is likely to slow, as presidents and deans have concluded that they have been largely ineffective because of the unpreparedness from both professors and students.” This is not forward thinking in a global society that embraces English as the language of science and business.

June 9, 2011

[Fenton Johnson] Sex in the time of AIDS

Thirty years ago, on June 5, 1981, the Centers for Disease Control published a notice of a strange illness affecting five Los Angeles gay men, two of whom died before the report could be published. The illness soon acquired the designation AIDS, along with a burden of fear and misinformation that it has never quite shaken.The decades of terror and rage and sacrifice and nobility that followed have

June 9, 2011

[William Pesek] It’s bubble time as Asia braces for Fed’s QE3

Pretend you’re Darmin Nasution, Indonesia’s central bank governor, and inflation is running at about 6 percent. Do you raise interest rates or cut them? This isn’t a trick question, but one facing Asia’s monetary authorities as they brace for a possible third round of U.S. quantitative easing, an effort by the central bank to get more money into the economy. No matter what Federal Reserve official

June 8, 2011

[Liu Shijin] China’s true status

Despite the remarkable economic and social development it has achieved since reform and opening-up in 1978, China is still a developing nation, as indicated by both its per capita economic indices and its economic and social structure.It is necessary to take into account a country’s economic aggregate and its per capita output to accurately measure its real economic and social development levels.

June 8, 2011

[Jonathan Alter] Don’t believe critics, education reform works

America’s education-reform movement ― the most significant social movement of our time ― is just completing another productive school year, with hundreds of districts beefing up accountability and standards. Amid grim news about budget cuts, the year brought new awareness that relying on seniority alone in determining teacher layoffs is mindless. It’s like saying that if the Chicago Bulls wanted t

June 8, 2011