The unhappy marriage of convenience between the United States and Pakistan survived another squabble last week.Pakistan threatened to halt CIA drone strikes against militants in its tribal areas, one of the only effective U.S. tools for hitting al-Qaeda and Taliban operatives based there. Pakistani officials then leaked their demand that Washington sharply reduce the number of CIA and special-forc

April 21, 2011

We all know that Democrats want to spend more on people and Republicans want to tax people less. But giving someone an extra dollar is no different than taking a dollar less from that person; raising spending is the same as cutting taxes, and cutting taxes is the same as raising spending.Gee, maybe Democrats are closet Republicans, and Republicans are closet Democrats.Of course some spending isn’t

April 21, 2011

The administration of U.S. President Barack Obama has abandoned plans to try several terrorists, including the alleged mastermind of the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks, in civilian courts. Instead, it will use military tribunals to administer justice. It is a sad decision. The United States should be leading efforts to show that the fight against terrorism does not require sacrificing the very values that

April 20, 2011

When I heard that McDonald’s planned to hire 50,000 people next Tuesday, I thought it was a sign of reluctance by suburban kids to enter the workforce by wearing the Golden Arches.I’m one of the many Americans who have worked at a McDonald’s, which puts me in the company of Jay Leno, Carl Lewis, Keenen Ivory Wayans, Andie MacDowell and Macy Gray. But it’s a bigger group than that. Some estimates s

April 20, 2011

There is no magic wand that will bring down the price of gasoline, which has once again crossed the $4 mark. But there is a long-term solution that will inoculate us from higher costs in the future.The Obama administration can’t do much to lower the price of a gallon of gas, but it is on the cusp of a crucial decision that could help consumers come out ahead because they would need less gas.Offici

April 20, 2011

Despite the anti-Semitic ranting of Mel Gibson, the public gulf between Roman Catholics and Jews has narrowed during recent decades. It started with overtures from Pope John Paul II between 1979 and 2000, during which time he visited Auschwitz and Jerusalem. After following his predecessor to Auschwitz in 2006, Pope Benedict XVI slammed Holocaust deniers in 2009, then set off on an Israel trip. An

April 20, 2011

The coming Friday, April 22, marks the first “Saemaul Day” since the National Assembly passed a bill in February to commemorate the anniversary of former President Park Chung-hee’s launching of Saemaul Undong or the New Community Movement in 1970. But actual celebrations will be deferred to May as related authorities feared misunderstanding about their motivation in connection with the April 27 by

April 19, 2011

The government has set down a policy outline for overcoming the power shortage this summer, which will be inevitable due to the crisis at Tokyo Electric Power Co.’s Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant. Under the outline, the government will invoke a relevant law, but there will be no planned rolling outages. Efforts to save power on the part of enterprises and households will be crucial.It is esti

April 19, 2011

Peru’s political system has been ailing for decades. Corruption, violence and deep economic inequalities have left it weakened. Now, the first round of voting in the presidential race, which took place Sunday, threatens to leave the country in critical condition.From a field of five candidates, two emerged as front-runners likely to move on to a runoff election June 5. Both appear wanting in exper

April 19, 2011

Timothy Geithner says borrowing more from China to finance tax cuts for the most affluent Americans would be irresponsible.The Treasury secretary has it backward. The real question is whether Beijing is willing to double down on a nation whose balance sheet makes Italy look good. Holding $1.2 trillion of U.S. debt is a fast-growing risk to China.Traders have a theory about why the euro is reasonab

April 19, 2011

Zbigniew Brzezinski is a fan of President Barack Obama’s foreign policy, with important caveats. He supports most of the policies of the past three months in the turbulent Middle East, thinks the president has improved relations with the Europeans and the Russians, and believes the summit meeting in January between Obama and President Hu Jintao of China was a success. At the same time, he faults t

April 19, 2011

Can Burma have its cake and eat it too? The answer rests with ASEAN. Right after the new civilian government was installed at the end of March in Naypyidaw, one of the first important tasks President Thein Sein did was to submit a letter to the ASEAN Secretariat stating Burma’s readiness to take up the grouping’s chair in 2014.At the 11th summit meeting in Vientiane in November 2004, under pressur

April 19, 2011

As one month has passed since the Great East Japan Earthquake, moves to provide employment assistance to victims of the disaster are spreading nationwide.Companies in the railway, video game, food, medicine and financial service sectors, among others, have come out with job offers for victims of the March 11 catastrophe. About 170 corporations have posted job offers with an online employment infor

April 18, 2011

In case it wasn’t clear already, we now know what the 2012 election will be about: how fast to cut federal spending, whether to raise taxes and what to do about healthcare, especially Medicare.President Obama’s awkwardly named “deficit reduction framework,” unveiled Wednesday, has the usual list of flaws of any long-term budget proposal. It doesn’t tie up every loose end. It includes a couple of “

April 18, 2011