The Korea Herald

[Kim Seong-kon] Leaving Warsaw, pondering on Sophie’s Choice

A few weeks ago, I flew to Warsaw to deliver a lecture at the University of Warsaw. As I had anticipated, Polish students, unlike their Korean counterparts, were eager to learn and full of intellectual curiosity. I talked for 1 1/2 hours and yet no one fell asleep or left the lecture hall in the middle. Nobody was texting or checking Facebook either. Polish students were radically different from Korean students who are infatuated with their smartphones. Moreover, I was greatly impressed when I h

May 16, 2017

[Kim Seong-kon] Leaving Warsaw, pondering on Sophie’s Choice

[Daniel Shapiro] How Trump can have an impact in the Holy Land

In planning for President Donald Trump’s first trip abroad, White House staffers will be looking for images and achievements that will reinforce the president’s agenda, appeal to him personally, and present him to the world as a global statesman. While in Israel and the Palestinian Authority from May 22-23, there is an easy stop he should make to accomplish all three goals: President Trump should visit Rawabi.Rawabi is the first new, entirely planned Palestinian city in the West Bank, long heral

May 16, 2017

[LeeJae-min] Bringing the country back together

So, it’s President Moon. Last week’s presidential by-election in South Korea picked President Moon Jae-in of the liberal Democratic Party as the person to lead the country for the next five years. The 8-month political scandal and the lack of national leadership have left the country in tatters. And now everything has been dumped on his lap.So, over the next several weeks he should make decisions for a plethora of issues, or at least confirm where his government stands on them -- not as a matter

May 16, 2017

[LeeJae-min] Bringing the country back together

[Albert R. Hunt] The age of Trump is ‘defining deviancy down’

Pat Moynihan, the great politician-intellectual, warned about the dangers of “defining deviancy down,” in which worse and worse behavior comes to be accepted as the norm.　The late New York senator’s essay, almost a quarter century ago, was about crime and family structure. Today it applies to the Trump presidency: the danger that chronic lying, ignorance of history and policy, petty invective, racial demagoguery and personal greed fall within the realm of the norm.If President Donald Trump gives

May 16, 2017

[Mihir Sharma] The populist wave hasn’t crested yet

At a victory rally for France’s young new President Emmanuel Macron outside the Louvre last week, I was struck by the generational gap between the candidate and his most animated supporters. Most younger people in the crowd looked relieved but far from overjoyed; the most visibly enthusiastic among them were of West African or Arab descent. And when Macron took the stage and began to speak, it was the older heads in the crowd that nodded at his words.I remember, in 2002, watching French students

May 16, 2017

[Editorial] No time for dialogue

North Korea said Monday that it had successfully test-fired a new intermediate-range ballistic missile which could be tipped with a large nuclear warhead. The North Korean Central News Agency said, “The newly developed land-to-land missile, called “Hwasong-12,” rose 2111.5 kilometers and hit its target zone in international waters, 787 kilometers away from the launch site.” The agency said the warhead detonation system had worked in the harsh conditions of atmospheric re-entry, a key stage in th

May 16, 2017

[Other view] US risks rupture by supporting Kurdish group

The slow pace of US efforts to take Islamic State strongholds Raqqa in Syria and Mosul in Iraq have produced a risky US move in relations with NATO ally Turkey.　The US will begin providing heavy weaponry, including armored vehicles, to the Syrian Kurdish group, YPG. Its forces have been fighting alongside US Special Operations troops and other enemies of the Islamic State in Syria in a long effort to take Raqqa. The problem is that Turkey considers the YPG to be a mortal enemy, allied with the P

May 16, 2017

[Robert Park] Viable and principled alternative to war

In an April 27 interview, US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson made plain that a denuclearized Korean Peninsula was the Trump administration’s only goal. Tillerson also clarified that Trump isn’t interested in human rights, nor the anguished yearning of millions of Koreans for a reunified Peninsula.　 He declared, “We have been very clear as to what our objectives are. And equally clear what our objectives are not. And we do not seek regime change, we do not seek a collapse of the regime, we do no

May 15, 2017

[Robert Park] Viable and principled alternative to war

[The Record] After Comey’s firing, bring in special counsel

There may be a case for firing James Comey, the now-former director of the FBI. But President Donald Trump did not make the case Tuesday when he abruptly fired him. The dismissal was so abrupt that Comey first learned of it while speaking in Los Angeles as the news broke on television. He first thought it was a joke. It was a not a joke.　The decision to fire Comey was made on the recommendations of Attorney General Jeff Sessions and Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein. The reasons given relat

May 15, 2017

[Other view] Please stop talking about Russia, Mr. President

Since President Donald Trump fired FBI Director James Comey on Tuesday, the White House has offered an evolving series of rationales for the decision. Trump himself offered a new one on Thursday -- several, actually -- but he didn‘t exactly clarify things.In an interview with NBC News, after making the implausible claim that the Federal Bureau of Investigation had been in turmoil under Comey’s watch, Trump said: “And in fact when I decided to just do it” -- that is, to fire Comey -- “I said to m

May 15, 2017

[Trudy Rubin] Trump is playing into Putin’s hands

The irony was too rich.　President Trump meets with the Russian foreign minister the day after he fires the man who’s heading the investigation into his campaign’s possible collusion with Russia on election meddling.　You needn’t be clairvoyant to imagine what Sergei Lavrov must be thinking: “The Kremlin doesn’t need to waste time trying to undermine Americans’ faith in their institutions. Trump is doing that fine on his own.”　Trump’s decision to ax FBI Director James Comey will fray Americans’ fa

May 15, 2017

[Trudy Rubin] Trump is playing into Putin’s hands

[Christopher Balding] Is China really deleveraging?

There’s growing evidence that China is finally scaling back its epic borrowing binge. That’s important for a lot of reasons, not least for reducing risk and avoiding a financial crisis. The question is whether the government can sustain the pain.Regulators in Beijing are well aware of the risks that excessive leverage poses, and have tried many times over the years to crack down. Yet they routinely fail to rein in local government officials who get promoted by boosting economic growth, regardles

May 15, 2017

[Jonathan Bernstein] Trump’s know-nothing tour de force

I was going to write about something else today, but frankly I just can‘t work around what Donald Trump has said in multiple interviews released in the last few days. You should really see the full interviews, or at least the excerpts I’m linking to, but here‘s the gist:- He told the Economist he invented the use of “priming the pump” with regard to the economy. It’s probably most associated with Franklin Roosevelt, and even if Trump meant “came upon it” rather than “came up with it” it‘s remark

May 15, 2017

[Other view] Russian meddling? Seeing is believing

If Americans wanted to view photos of Wednesday’s meeting between President Donald Trump, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov and Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak, they had only one source to turn to: the Russian government. The Oval Office meeting reportedly was arranged at Russian President Vladimir Putin’s request, and Trump was all too eager to oblige.It seems the White House press office was so worried about potentially bad optics, American journalists were banned from the usual photo o

May 14, 2017

[Max Boot] French are smarter

Americans have a long and ignoble tradition of telling jokes about the French. Old chestnuts such as “I’m selling a French rifle: Never shot, dropped only once” became popular again in 2003 when the French -- wisely as it turns out -- refused to join their US allies in the invasion of Iraq. The House of Representatives cafeteria even renamed french fries as “freedom fries.”　Turns out the joke’s on us.　The American electorate in November chose as our president an international laughingstock who i

May 14, 2017

[Andres Oppenheimer] Trump’s Mexico bashing helps leftist candidate

The race for Mexico’s 2018 presidential elections has drawn zero interest in the United States so far, but it should be in the headlines. Thanks to President Trump’s fake claims about Mexico, the country may soon elect its first populist leftist president in recent memory.　The latest polls show that Trump’s Mexico bashing has had the predictable effect of creating a nationalist backlash in Mexico, which is helping leftist candidate Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador climb steadily in the polls for the

May 14, 2017

[Ann McFeatters] Not a dictatorship ? yet

Keep telling yourself: The US does not live in a dictatorship. The US does NOT live in a dictatorship.　Even though President Donald Trump gave his daughter and son-in-law top White House jobs, ensuring they get richer, and promised visas to rich investors.　Even though Trump is running roughshod over consumer protection laws, environmental protection laws, civil rights laws, long-standing treaties and relationships with allies.　Even though Trump’s proposed tax code changes would benefit him perso

May 14, 2017

[Michael Schuman] Xi’s big road is going to be bumpy

As they’ve guided China’s remarkable economic ascent over the last four decades, the country’s leaders have largely been content to focus on raising incomes and building factories. They’ve steered clear of messy international entanglements that could undermine economic progress, and with it the public support that keeps them in power.Over the past decade, of course, a richer, more confident China has attempted to assert greater global influence. President Xi Jinping has boldly presented himself

May 14, 2017

[Michael Schuman] Xi’s big road is going to be bumpy

[Michael Schuman] China has world’s biggest productivity problem

Just about everybody assumes that China will overtake the US as the world’s indispensable economy. One factor, however, could slow its seemingly relentless march and cast doubt on China’s prospects for becoming an advanced economy: faltering productivity.Sure, China is advancing daily in wealth, technology and expertise. But nothing is inevitable in economics. As costs rise and the labor force shrinks due to Beijing’s decadeslong “one-child” policy, China will need to squeeze a lot more out of e

May 14, 2017

[Adam Minter] China’s hidden pollution

Last month, Chinese President Xi Jinping directed his government to build a new city for the “millennium to come.” It would rise on rural land about 60 miles south of Beijing, guided by the principles of “ecological protection and green development.” And it would become a model for a new kind of urban expansion.It was an attractive vision. Over the next few weeks, however, reports emerged of vast pollution in and around Xiongan, the area Xi hopes to develop. That’s no surprise: China’s four-deca

May 12, 2017