[Kuni Miyake] China should heed Pearl Harbor’s lessons

The anniversary of Pearl Harbor is commemorated on Dec. 8 in Japan -- the time locally when thousands of miles away, its ships and warplanes sank much of the US Pacific Fleet and launched war against America. 　For 75 years now, many Japanese have reflected on that moment with great remorse, appalled by the hubris and miscalculation that led to the attack. Later this month, Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe will personally travel to Pearl Harbor to commemorate the tragedy. Sadly, though, the lea

Dec. 9, 2016

Trump shows thin grasp of global issues

When it comes to the One-China Policy, nations all around the world know that they can expect a vicious and nasty reaction from Beijing for breaking this long-standing diplomatic protocol. Even if one is committed to the One China Policy, like Singapore Deputy Premier Lee Hsien Loong, who visited Taiwan in July 2004 just before he became the prime minister of Singapore.For Thailand, former Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra comes to mind. During his first term in office, the then Thai leader open

Dec. 8, 2016

[Ravi Velloor] Trump call with Taiwan leader raises questions about future US Asia policy

The early contours of US President-elect Donald Trump‘s Asia policy is coming into view and here it is — there is no clear plan.Trump’s telephone conversation with Taiwan‘s President Tsai Ing-wen suggests the scattershot diplomacy that lies ahead as the first American president who’s never before held public office or had military experience prepares to take charge of the lone superpower on Jan. 20.The phone conversation, announced first by the Trump transition team, is regarded as the first kno

Dec. 8, 2016

[Shashi Tharoor] India’s demonetization disaster

On Nov. 8, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced that, at the stroke of midnight, some 14 trillion rupees worth of 500- and 1,000-rupee notes – 86 percent of all the currency in circulation -- would no longer be legal tender. With that, India’s economy was plunged into chaos.Modi’s stated goal was to make good on his campaign pledge to fight “black money:” the illicit proceeds -- often held as cash -- of tax evasion, crime, and corruption. He also hoped to render worthless the counterfei

Dec. 8, 2016

[Robert B. Reich] Trump‘s trickle-down populism

Last week, President-elect Donald Trump triumphantly celebrated Carrier’s decision to reverse its plan to close a furnace plant and move jobs to Mexico. Some 800 jobs will remain in Indianapolis.“Corporate America is going to have to understand that we have to take care of our workers,” Trump told the New York Times.“The free market has been sorting it out and America‘s been losing,” Vice President-elect Michael Pence added, as Trump interjected, “Every time, every time.”So what’s the Trump alte

Dec. 8, 2016

Eyes on Putin: Seeking clues in Russian leader’s speech

Russian President Vladimir Putin’s annual State of the Nation address, delivered at the Kremlin on Thursday, was rather restrained for him. But it did offer some clues to his idea of relations with the new administration in Washington.Putin has no real political problems at home, his United Russia party having won a constitutional majority in the Duma, the two-house Russian parliament, in elections earlier this year. If he has any problems as Russia’s leader, they are economic. Energy amounted t

Dec. 7, 2016

[Trudy Rubin] Trump’s loose talk has global reach

What would happen if a president talked to world leaders in the same explosive patter Donald Trump perfected on the campaign trail?You can get a clue from the off-the-cuff phone talks the president-elect has been holding with foreign leaders since winning the election. These freewheeling calls have veered from insulting to astonishing and raised questions about US policy shifts that Trump seems not to have intended.Case in point: Trump holds a phone schmooze with the Taiwanese president, apparen

Dec. 7, 2016

75 years later, hard lesson of Pearl Harbor ? and Sept. 11 ? endures

Leroy Barber grew up in rural New London, Wisconsin, hunting and fishing with two of his brothers. He enlisted in the US Navy, trained at the Great Lakes facility north of Chicago and was assigned to a battleship. Barber enjoyed being a sailor, missed his brothers and advised them to join up. The US Navy made an exception to its rule against putting family members on one boat — a decision their father sought to reverse — but America was not at war, and Hawaii was about as far from Europe’s fight

Dec. 7, 2016

[Jean Pisani-Ferry] Preventing the Next Eurozone Crisis Starts Now

European leaders have devoted scant attention to the future of the eurozone since July 2012, when Mario Draghi, the European Central Bank’s president, famously committed to do “whatever it takes” to save the common currency. For more than four years, they have essentially subcontracted the eurozone’s stability and integrity to the central bankers. But, while the ECB has performed the job skillfully, this quiet, convenient arrangement is coming to an end, because no central bank can solve politic

Dec. 6, 2016

[A. Gary Shilling] Emerging market winners and losers after Trump

Donald Trump’s electoral triumph has stoked expectations for a fiscal stimulus that will propel US economic growth and spread to the rest of the world. For emerging markets, though, his presidency ends a long party. For some of them, it’s about time economic reality hit home. For others, the future looks a bit brighter.Early in this economic recovery, investors leaped into emerging-market stocks and bonds as those economies and markets promised faster growth than in the developed world. There wa

Dec. 6, 2016

[Mihir Sharma] Message to Modi: Do no more harm

India again posted world-beating growth numbers last week: Gross domestic product grew 7.3 percent in the quarter between July and September. But the question remains, so what? After all, none of this data covers the period after Nov. 8, the date Prime Minister Narendra Modi abruptly declared 86 percent of India’s currency would be withdrawn from circulation.In the weeks since, the chaos accompanying “demonetization” hasn’t eased up noticeably. It seems likely the disruption to the economy, espe

Dec. 6, 2016

[Francis Wilkinson] Coming clash on Trump’s immigration plan

Perhaps no battle in Donald Trump’s presidency will be as pitched, or public, as the coming fight over undocumented immigrants. If he pursues his stated goal of deporting 2 to 3 million undocumented immigrants, a network of pro-immigrant cities, institutions and activists is poised to make the process as visibly contentious as possible.Trump will have authority to deport millions. While individual cases can be contested and prolonged in immigration court — the system is already overloaded — laws

Dec. 5, 2016

[Antony Davies & James R. Harrigan]‘Cafeteria economists’ get it wrong on price gouging

Catholics who choose to accept some church teachings but not others are known as “cafeteria Catholics.” The problem, in the eyes of the Church, is that Catholic theology isn’t a collection of disparate items of faith to be selectively chosen. It is a coherent body of thought that leads to a set of reasoned conclusions. To reject some teachings while retaining others is to ignore the arguments underlying all of them. And so it is today with so many amateur “cafeteria economists.”These amateurs se

Dec. 5, 2016