Former Lebanese Prime Minister Saad Hariri is being held by Saudi authorities under what Lebanese sources say amounts to house arrest in Riyadh, apparently as part of the Saudi campaign to squeeze Iran and its Lebanese ally, Hezbollah.　A startling account of Hariri’s forced detention was provided Friday by knowledgeable sources in Beirut. It offers important new evidence of the tactics used by Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman to bolster his rule by mobilizing anti-Iran sentiment at home an

Nov. 14, 2017

Just a couple of years ago, Latin America’s fight against political corruption began to break new ground. And perhaps nowhere has the renovation been more dramatic -- and successful -- than in Guatemala, where popular outrage, fearless auditors and most notably a team of crack foreign anti-graft investigators with a sweeping brief have pursued criminals in the highest offices. And yet as Guatemalans have learned, in a region where governing institutions have been clay in the hands of powerful el

Nov. 14, 2017

The last line of defense in checking President Donald Trump’s foreign policy power is the old guard of the Republican Party, and those watchmen are about to go quietly into the night.A 2018 Republican sweep would cripple two key Senate committees. The Senate Foreign Relations Committee and the Senate Armed Services Committee are supposed to oversee the foreign policy and the national security apparatus. Trump has brought them to heel.He has belittled the outspoken Foreign Relations Committee Cha

Nov. 14, 2017

In a surprise announcement, the Chinese Ministry of Finance declared on Friday that it will henceforth allow foreigners to own Chinese banks outright and gain majority stakes in insurance and securities firms. While dramatic, this isn’t China’s first effort to open up its economy to outside expertise and competition. If they want this one to succeed, officials will need to do more than hang out a “for sale” sign.　Ever since joining the World Trade Organization in 2000, China has continued to pro

Nov. 13, 2017

As a Californian, I’m proud that our state boasts so many leading technology companies. As a member of the House Intelligence Committee leading an investigation into Russia’s interference in the 2016 election, I need the assistance of those same companies in our investigation so that together we can protect future elections from foreign influence.In January, the Intelligence Community assessed that the Russians’ sophisticated campaign was designed to help Donald Trump, damage Hillary Clinton and

Nov. 13, 2017

News reports indicate that Sayfullo Saipov, who allegedly killed eight and wounded 11 in the recent truck attack in New York, entered the country from Uzbekistan through the diversity visa lottery. He is not the first presumed terrorist to enter using the program. Lottery terrorists include Hesham Mohamed Ali Hedayet, who shot up an El-Al ticket counter in 2002, killing two, and Imran Mandhai, who planned to bomb power stations in Florida the same year.The diversity visa lottery seems ideally su

Nov. 13, 2017

President Donald Trump’s visit last week was a reminder of the risk faced by South Korea from its northern neighbor. You would think the mounting tensions would send South Korean stocks crashing. That hasn’t been the case.　In fact, South Korea is one of the strongest-performing world stock markets this year, with the iShares MSCI South Korea ETF, known as EWY, up almost 43 percent. And that’s after losses in three out of the previous six years.　Markets have a history of ignoring or brushing off

Nov. 12, 2017

Shake, Rattle and Roll.The title of that rock and roll oldie popped into my head as I followed President Trump’s travels to South Korea and China, along with this week’s stunning developments in Saudi Arabia.The president clearly wants to shake up the region -- and North Korea’s Kim Jong-un -- by convincing Asian leaders he’s willing to use force to compel Kim to denuclearize.Meantime, Trump is cheering this week’s efforts by Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman to shake up the Mideast. MBS (a

Nov. 12, 2017

As President Donald Trump makes his way across Asia, ears in local capitals have picked up a subtle but unmistakable change in messaging from the US administration. The shift focuses on an apparently innocuous term: “the Indo-Pacific.” US National Security Adviser H.R. McMaster introduced the president’s itinerary to reporters as “a great opportunity to demonstrate America’s and the Trump administration’s commitment to the Indo-Pacific.” Trump himself has used the term and it’s all over the offi

Nov. 12, 2017

The reason why Flannery O’Connor and other Southern writers often wrote about “freaks,” she said, was because “we are still able to recognize one.” Writing about murderers, racists, traveling Bible-selling hypocrites, O’Connor was a master of her art, the strange genre she called grotesque. It was her way of telling the truth through lies and good through evil.Such writing was possible, she said, because for the most part, Southern writers still held “some conception of the whole man,” a faint n

Nov. 10, 2017