It comes with a nice office and a grand title. You would probably have a pretty generous expense account. And there may well be a lucrative consulting gig with Goldman Sachs Group Inc. when it is all over.Even so, you would have to be bordering on insanity to accept the role of European Central Bank president when Jean-Claude Trichet steps down in October this year.It’s the job from hell. The euro

Viewpoints Feb. 27, 2011

Korea’s inflation woes are deepening as the worsening turmoil in Libya has sent oil prices on an upward spiral. The price of Dubai crude oil, South Korea’s benchmark, stayed above the $100 mark for the three consecutive days on Thursday. If the Dubai oil price remains above $100 for two more days, the government has to upgrade its energy alert level from the current “blue” to “yellow.”The surge in

Editorial Feb. 24, 2011

Press reports say several hundred residents in Sinuiju, a North Korean city on the border with China, clashed with security forces on Feb. 18 over the death of a merchant during a police crackdown on a market. On Feb. 14, small protests reportedly broke out in three northeastern cities of the impoverished country over fuel and food shortages.Are these signs that the “Jasmine Revolution” that start

Editorial Feb. 24, 2011

As CD sales plummeted, music executives looked in hope toward a new business model: Instead of trying to sell albums for $15 to $20 apiece, offer unlimited access to songs online for a flat monthly fee. The idea, however, has yet to catch on with the masses of music fans. The main impediment for many years was that subscribers couldn’t use the services on the MP3 players that most of them owned, A

Viewpoints Feb. 24, 2011

Every serious global problem has an important China angle. The Chinese are everywhere, and they’re not going away any time soon.As a matter of fact, the Chinese are firmly convinced that this is “their” century, and that they will displace the United States as global economic leader.The last country with a dominant global economic role that had to face a boisterous, fast-growing upstart was Britai

Viewpoints Feb. 24, 2011

The result in Hamburg couldn’t have been more punishing for the Christian Democratic Union and for Chancellor Angela Merkel. The first of seven regional elections in Germany this year left no doubt about where German voters stand on a much larger issue: the euro crisis.The race for mayor of the city-state, the equivalent of the premier in other German states, was won by the candidate from the oppo

Viewpoints Feb. 24, 2011

Our country is bankrupt. It’s not bankrupt in 30 years or five years. It’s bankrupt today.Want proof? Look at President Barack Obama’s 2010 budget. It showed a massive fiscal gap over the next 75 years, the closure of which requires immediate tax increases, spending cuts, or some combination totaling 8 percent of gross domestic product. To put 8 percent of GDP in perspective, this year’s employee

Viewpoints Feb. 24, 2011

Investors of the world, unite and buy Australian bank debt. Why? Moody’s Investors Service suggests you shouldn’t.Really, in our post-U.S.-crisis world, is there a better contrarian indicator? Credit raters missed the Asian crisis, Russia’s default, the tech-stock crash, Enron, the U.S. housing bubble, Wall Street’s collapse and Europe’s meltdown. Now, we’re supposed to care what they think about

Viewpoints Feb. 23, 2011

After making a big splash at the Conservative Political Action Conference in Washington this month, Donald Trump was asked if he is considering a run for the presidency.“I’m incredibly tempted,” he responded.If Trump gives in to temptation, his past actions and positions may collectively provide the biggest handicap for a major candidate in the history of presidential politics.If he decides to run

Viewpoints Feb. 23, 2011

The offer of two squadrons of used F-16 jet fighters ― gratis ― from the United States seems too good to be true. With its aging defense weaponry systems in desperate need of upgrading, the Indonesian Military (TNI) signaled last week it had accepted the offer under a U.S. grant. The ball is back in the U.S. court to decide whether to proceed with the deal or not.But wait. Nothing is as free as it

Viewpoints Feb. 22, 2011

BAGHDAD ― Frustrated with high unemployment, poor public services and corruption, Iraqis have been transfixed by media coverage of the uprising in Cairo. But while many are filled with admiration for the Egyptian people’s efforts, most here appear reluctant to follow suit.“I never watched any news on TV, but now I am following it daily,” said Namareq Sultan, 22, a medical student in Baghdad, regar

Viewpoints Feb. 22, 2011

President Barack Obama’s call for “investments” in education, infrastructure and science and health research is dismissed by most congressional Republicans as a fig leaf for more big-government spending. That underlies the House’s decision Feb. 19 to slash $61 billion from an array of discretionary spending programs in the current fiscal year budget. This may make proponents feel good, yet, as alm

Viewpoints Feb. 22, 2011

When the Ministry of Strategy and Finance submitted a bill on Islamic bonds to the National Assembly in September 2009, its main motivation was to secure new sources of foreign capital that Korea could tap into when liquidity dries up due to turmoil in the global financial system ― such as the collapse of Lehman Brothers in 2008. But the bill gained added importance following a Korean consortium’s

Editorial Feb. 18, 2011