PARIS ― Is there anything people can possibly do these days to disgust or unnerve themselves? Or is the only barrier to bad behavior massive societal shunning, the likes of which isn’t noticed by those who are too engrossed with themselves to pay attention?I’m asking this because it seemed that everywhere I looked recently, I was bombarded by stunning acts of shamelessness ― to the point where shamelessness arguably WAS the major trend in the news. Let’s look at a few examples.― The “sequester”:

Viewpoints March 10, 2013

With the sequester now beginning, I find myself thinking about Robert F. Kennedy ― and 46 years ago when I was an intern in his Senate office.The nation was going through a difficult time in 1967. America was deeply split over civil rights and the Vietnam War. Many of our cities were burning. The war was escalating.But RFK was upbeat. He was also busy and intense ― drafting legislation, lining up votes, speaking to the poor, inspiring the young.I was awed by his energy and optimism, and by his o

Viewpoints March 10, 2013

A few days after NBC News uncovered the Obama administration’s legal justifications for killing American citizens, I was sitting in Baltimore-Washington International Airport.The infamous “white paper” lays out in tortured English the lengths to which the president will go in his war against al-Qaida. Americans who renounce their country and pledge themselves to an organization willing to slaughter the innocent do not (and should not) rank among the most sympathetic of characters. When thinking

Viewpoints March 10, 2013

The death of Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez has the potential to birth a dramatic change in his oil-rich country’s relationship with the United States. But it may take years to materialize, if it ever does.Much will depend on how far the Obama administration is willing to go to encourage Chavez’s successor. Before Chavez’s death Tuesday, Vice President Nicolas Maduro had implied that the United States had somehow given the president cancer.That absurd assertion contrasts with foreign policy an

Viewpoints March 10, 2013

President Park Geun-hye’s proposal to establish new ministries and make other changes to the organization of government agencies is mired in protracted negations between the ruling Saenuri Party and the main opposition Democratic United Party. Her repeated appeal to the National Assembly to promptly pass the underlying bill has fallen on deaf ears.The ruling party, with 153 seats in the 300-member National Assembly, finds itself languishing over the lack of progress in its talks with the opposit

Editorial March 8, 2013

Consumers pay a 10 percent value-added tax each time they purchase a good or a service, not directly but through the seller. A change in payment would increase the tax collections by up to 7.1 trillion won each year, according to a report from a research institute.This should be good news to President Park Geun-hye, who says she will make good on her election promise to spend an annual average 27 trillion won on her welfare programs additionally each year without any tax increases. The administr

Editorial March 8, 2013

The death of President Hugo Chavez marks the beginning of a perilous and hopeful moment for Venezuela and the Western Hemisphere. There is no denying the impact of the charismatic ex-paratrooper, a plotter and survivor of coups who demolished Venezuela’s political power structure, won three elections with wide support and used the wealth from the world’s largest oil reserves to advance, across the Andes and beyond, his home- brewed ideology of “Bolivarian socialism.” How long that incoherent ide

Viewpoints March 8, 2013

Tensions are heightening again on the Korean Peninsula as North Korea ratchets up war threats in protest against the annual U.S.-South Korea joint military exercises and imminent new U.N. Security Council sanctions for its nuclear test on Feb. 12.On Tuesday, the Supreme Command of the North Korean People’s Army declared in a statement that the armistice agreement that ended the 1950-53 Korean War would be invalid from March 11. The statement, read by Kim Yong-chol, a hard-line general suspected

Viewpoints March 7, 2013

E-mart, the nation’s largest discount store chain, has taken a bold step for its non-regular workers. The retail giant announced earlier this week that it would grant regular employee status to 10,000 workers currently employed by its in-house subcontractors.The retailer plans to convert the status of the large number of workers next month, entitling them to stable employment until retirement age, a 27 percent salary increase and various welfare benefits, including health insurance and education

Editorial March 7, 2013

This editorial was produced in an office, so it may be 13 percent less productive and efficient at its job than if it were written at home. Then again, if it were produced at home, away from the boss’s gaze, it might still be goofing off, collecting glib phrases and sentence fragments without cohering into anything persuasive. In the latest debate over telecommuting, sparked by Yahoo! Inc.’s announcement that all employees working from home must start showing up at the office, the two camps have

Viewpoints March 7, 2013