Here at the intersection of the news media, policy and politics, the unsubtle destabilizing -- and sometimes deliberate sabotaging -- of our democracy is proceeding on pace. America’s please-lie-to-me voters, who prefer to get their news and their political promises from folks who know how to make them feel good, knew where they could turn on State of the Union night. And all of us who want to understand how our political games are really being played these days need to take the time to wa

Viewpoints Feb. 14, 2023

Growing up I remember hearing the phrase “Have you no shame?” That question must have held some power back in the day. But if you asked that now, some shapers of our current political culture would respond with a resounding “No.” Hyper-partisanship has moved us into a post-shame world. Shame is the internal, uncomfortable sense arising from the consciousness of something dishonorable or improper, whether that has been done by oneself or another. While shame is a negative

Viewpoints Feb. 7, 2023

My book on the economic history of the 20th century, published last fall, did not include a chapter on the question of the future or “what we should do next,” because my frequent co-author, Stephen S. Cohen, convinced me that whatever I wrote would come to look outdated and silly within six months. He was right: Such arguments are better left to commentaries like this one. So, if I had written a final chapter looking to the future, what should I have said? Prior to the phantom text,

Viewpoints Feb. 6, 2023

France has waged a counterterrorism campaign in the small West African country of Burkina Faso since 2018. But on Jan. 20, hundreds of protesters in the capital city of Ouagadougou waved Russian flags and demanded the French army’s ouster. Days later, the country’s military government told the French to leave within a month. Burkina Faso is just the latest African country where the Wagner Group, a Kremlin-linked mercenary organization, has become the face of Russia’s foreign po

Viewpoints Jan. 30, 2023

According to Russian President Vladimir Putin’s grand plan, this was to be the hard winter that would break Ukraine and divide its allies in the West. That hasn’t happened. Putin unleashed missile attacks on Ukraine’s cities and its electrical grid, but the Ukrainians repaired their transformers and fought on. Putin unleashed a mercenary force, the Wagner Group, which used convicts to try to take the eastern Ukrainian city of Bakhmut. They’re still trying. Putin cut natur

Viewpoints Jan. 20, 2023

Russia’s war in Ukraine has affected political life in countries around the world, and this influence has been greater in the countries that are politically closest not to Ukraine but to Russia. Because Ukraine is a democracy and Russia is an authoritarian kleptocracy, the war has highlighted a fundamental clash between alternative political systems. This dynamic raises the stakes considerably, because a military defeat for the democracy could be an invitation to dictators elsewhere to p

Viewpoints Jan. 19, 2023

As we begin the New Year and approach Chinese New Year, we need to reflect on how to face a grimly uncertain future. Gold prices are back up, the Ukraine war grinds on horrendously, politics are messier than ever and most analysts signal a recession ahead. The World Bank’s latest outlook sees the global economy growing by only 1.7 percent in 2023 and 2.7 percent in 2024. That’s a full one percentage decline from the IMF forecast in October 2022 for 2023 of 2.7 percent. The World Bank

Viewpoints Jan. 17, 2023

The transition of Croatia into the euro currency zone these days can teach us a lot about bitcoin in the US. According to the ideology of bitcoinism, the citizens of Croatia are making a huge mistake in obeying this transition and abandoning their legacy currency, the kuna. According to bitcoinism, the kuna will become ideal money for the people of Croatia because the government of Croatia decided to kill it. If that seems strange, then you haven’t spent enough time in the upside-down worl

Viewpoints Jan. 16, 2023

For the past few years, the US and the UK have followed strikingly similar political trajectories. Against all odds, populist uprisings captured both countries’ conservative parties, secured power and embarked on projects of national transformation. These efforts went badly (to put it generously), and in due course support for the rebellions subsided. Lately voters have been calling for a rethink. In both countries, this is proving harder than you’d suppose. In 2016, Americans stunne

Viewpoints Jan. 12, 2023

Metaphorically speaking, South Korea stands between the winds and the waves. That is to say, South Korea is located between continental and oceanic civilizations. According to the late cultural critic, Lee O-young, in the countries that belong to the continental civilization, people frequently use expressions with the word “wind” in it. For example, they say, “What wind brought you here?” Or “the coffee wind is blowing,” meaning: “Drinking coffee is fash

Viewpoints Jan. 11, 2023

The television split screen told the story. On one side, Republicans in the House of Representatives labored through the fourth of the 15 ballots they needed during four days of gridlock to choose Rep. Kevin McCarthy as speaker. On the other side, Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell stood beaming with President Joe Biden as they congratulated each other for a bipartisan success: a $1.6 billion deal to replace a crumbling highway bridge across the Ohio River. On one side, partisan dysfunctio

Viewpoints Jan. 11, 2023

Last July, two activists from Just Stop Oil entered London’s National Gallery and made their way to John Constable’s “The Hay Wain,” an iconic painting of rural England as it was 200 years ago. After covering the painting with an image of environmental destruction, they glued their hands to the frame and awaited arrest. Three months later, another pair of activists went to the National Gallery and threw tomato soup at Vincent van Gogh’s “Sunflowers.” In

Viewpoints Jan. 10, 2023

China’s recent decision to abandon its strict zero-COVID policy has led many to believe that its economy will bounce back. The Economist Intelligence Unit, for example, has revised its forecast for Chinese GDP growth in 2023 upward, to 5.2 percent. But growth recovery is not automatic, and China must contend with several challenges, including declining confidence among firms and households about their future incomes in the short run, insufficient productivity growth in the medium run, and

Viewpoints Jan. 6, 2023

Ever true to its traditions, Official Washington has celebrated its holidays by toasting its successes, and then cruising comfortably into yet another new year. So this is the right time to remind our capital’s cognoscenti that some areas of Washington governance can and must do better in 2023. We can think of three: executive, legislative and judicial. Each of the three official branches of government has always provided us with insider wisdom on just what is wrong with the other two. And

Viewpoints Jan. 5, 2023

For readers seeking a peaceful interlude at the start of the new year, I would suggest visiting the renovated celadon gallery at the National Museum of Korea. A moment of tranquility and self-reflection in aesthetic ambience may help reset and recharge for the challenging times ahead. The gallery has been carefully remodeled to emphasize the beauty of outstanding celadon objects from the Goryeo period (918-1392), the zenith of traditional Korean art. The centerpiece of the gallery is a room name

Viewpoints Jan. 5, 2023