[Kim Seong-kon] Reading Zack Rogow's poems in this harsh world

When I first heard Zack Rogow reading from his deeply moving poem, “Skating Lessons” at a poetry reading in San Francisco in 2006, I was mesmerized by his exquisite poetic sensitivity in the way he rendered a little girl’s painful initiation into adulthood on an ice rink and her father’s sad feelings of parting with her. The poem beautifully captured the moment of a father’s last skating lessons for his daughter: “I tugged my six-year-old around the rink/ shoc

June 11, 2019

[Lee Jae-min] A well-intended policy gone awry

After four deferrals in eight years since 2011, the revised Higher Education Act goes into effect this August. With roughly one month left, colleges and universities are preoccupied with how to implement new requirements under the law. There are still many unanswered questions and missing details. If you have any doubt, this is a well-intentioned law in all respects. It aims to protect the rights and working conditions of part-time lecturers at colleges and universities nationwide. Their employm

June 11, 2019

[Andrew Sheng] On board SS Planet Titanic

World Environment Day (June 5) was a good time to reflect on the existential threat of climate change.After five of the hottest years in living history, there is little doubt that climate change is moving center stage in the global agenda. The UN has warned that a million species are in danger of becoming extinct, with climate scientists claiming that we may have less than 10 to15 years to correct our carbon emission trajectory. It is no longer IF climate disaster will happen, only WHEN and how

June 10, 2019

[Carl P. Leubsdorf] Uncertain times for US, allies

Seventy-five years ago, thousands of American and allied sailors, soldiers and aviators braved heavy seas and murderous German fire in the historic invasion that began the decisive campaign to end Nazi control of Europe.　 The success of the D-Day landings, Europe’s liberation 11 months later and its economic recovery over ensuing decades were a tribute not only to the bravery of the invading troops but to the unprecedented military and political unity that American presidents from Frank

June 10, 2019

[David Ignatius] Trump disdains postwar architecture

President Trump spoke the right words in commemorating the 75th anniversary of D-Day, but did he mean them? So far, his presidency has been about defying the postwar order that was based on shared values and global partnership, rather than cementing its legacy. Trump spoke here Thursday at what he rightly described as “freedom’s altar,” the burial site for nearly 10,000 Americans who died in the 1944 invasion of Normandy and in subsequent battles that ultimately led to Nazi Ger

June 9, 2019

[George Soros] Europe’s silent majority speaks out

Last month’s elections to the European Parliament produced better results than one could have expected, and for a simple reason: The silent pro-European majority has spoken. What they said is that they want to preserve the values on which the European Union was founded, but that they also want radical changes in the way the EU functions. Their main concern is climate change. This favors the pro-European parties, especially the Greens. The anti-European parties, which cannot be expected

June 9, 2019

[Leonid Bershidsky] Russia after Vladimir Putin

Since the annexation of Crimea in 2014, Vladimir Putin’s Russia has, outwardly at least, been one of the world’s most stable and predictable regimes -- an assertive authoritarian government propped up by a mix of repression and acquiescence at home.So it’s only natural that some of the country’s leading analytical minds are looking to life after Putin is scheduled to depart in 2024: The present is too depressing to discuss.The Free Russia Foundation, a Washington-based th

June 6, 2019

[David Ignatius] Britain is club Trump wants to join

President Trump’s love-hate relationship with Britain has been on display in London this week. This ambivalence takes an especially bizarre turn in comments by the president and his supporters about British intelligence, historically America’s most important secret partner. After bashing prominent British figures on his way to London, Trump was on good behavior Tuesday, after a glittering state dinner the night before with the queen. He paid ritual homage to the special alliance betw

June 6, 2019

[Elizabeth Drew] To impeach or not to impeach

As the US Congress returns from a 10-day break, the question of whether the House of Representatives (controlled by the Democrats) should formally commence the process of impeaching President Donald Trump for misdeeds committed during his tenure -- and perhaps before -- has split the party. Theoretically, impeachment by the House would be followed by a trial in the Senate. But the Senate, controlled by the Republicans, is considered highly unlikely to convict their party’s standard-bearer,

June 5, 2019

[Kim Myong-sik] Foreign minister and rescue operations on Danube

Let me ask our readers a question: Do you think it was appropriate for our minister of foreign affairs to go to Budapest, Hungary, to join rescue operations for Korean tourists missing when their boat sank in the Danube River? I expect a negative answer, but President Moon Jae-in and his aides thought it was necessary. These days, many are concerned that Foreign Minister Kang Kyung-hwa is somewhat off the line of the denuclearization business against North Korea. Yet, she is responsible for the

June 5, 2019

[Kim Seong-kon] Captain Ahab and the white whale

In my class in the English Department at the University of California, Irvine, I had my American students discuss Herman Melville’s “Moby Dick” with reference to multicultural issues. Some students read the novel as a story about Ishmael’s initiation from adolescent innocence into adulthood experience. Indeed, through his encounter with Queequeg, Captain Ahab and Moby Dick, Ishmael learns the importance of embracing others -- such as different races, religions and culture

June 4, 2019

[Robert J. Fouser] Trump’s chances for re-election dim

During a short visit to Kyoto, Japan, on my way to Korea, a taxi driver told me that US President Donald Trump made him nervous because he is so unpredictable. I reassured him that many, if not most, Americans feel the same way. We concluded the short conversation by agreeing Trump is not fit to be president.The problem, of course, is that in a democracy, the people have the final say on the fitness of leaders. The problem for Trump is that he won the presidency in 2016 with a solid Electoral Co

June 4, 2019

[Jean Pisani-Ferry] Europe’s citizens say they want a more political EU

The most significant result of the recent European Parliament election is neither that conservatives and social democrats lost seats to Liberals and Greens, nor that far-right nationalists gained less than anticipated. It is that citizens voted in much larger numbers than anyone expected. From the first popular election of the European Parliament, in 1979, to the last one, in 2014, turnout inexorably declined, gradually falling from 63 percent to 43 percent. Five years ago, less than half of

June 3, 2019

[Francis Wilkinson] Democrats must win the war for truth

Poor old Robert Mueller.“Mr. Mueller seemed to expect that the system would work as it had in the past,” noted a news analysis last week in the New York Times. Former special counsel Mueller scrupulously followed legal and institutional rules as well as his own professional and personal code of ethics.As a result, the Times pointed out, a bit wistfully, the way the paper’s travel section might pine for the heyday of Palm Springs or old Havana, the old ways were swept aside, and

June 3, 2019

[David Ignatius] America is at war, in cyberspace

One of the least-discussed but perhaps most consequential comments by special counsel Robert Mueller in his appearance before reporters this week was his blunt counterintelligence assessment: “Russian intelligence officers, who are part of the Russian military, launched a concerted attack on our political system.” Here’s why this judgment is so important: The US military, backed by Mueller’s findings and those of the intelligence community, has responded by developing a t

June 2, 2019

[Hal Brands] Today’s US-China clash began at Tiananmen Square

Tuesday marks the 30th anniversary of the Tiananmen Square massacre. It was an event that profoundly shaped not only modern China, but also the US-China relationship.It is the odd anniversary that will pass virtually unobserved in the place where it had the greatest impact. Each year, around the anniversary, the government mobilizes an army of censors and trolls to stamp out any discussion of Tiananmen online.Yet for the world outside China, revisiting the Tiananmen Square massacre is crucial fo

June 2, 2019