House Republicans should consider themselves lucky to have wound up empty-handed after triggering a 16-day government shutdown and threatening to turn the United States into a deadbeat borrower. Had Senate leaders not rushed to the rescue, cutting a deal on a bill to reopen the government and lift the debt limit before Thursday’s deadline, the damage to the economy could have been enormous ― with the political fallout landing mainly on the House GOP, especially its uncompromising cadre of tea pa

Viewpoints Oct. 20, 2013

PARIS ― From the same people who brought you the “National Security Agency Spies on Foreigners” shocker, we now have the “Canada Is Secretly Devious” spectacle. Apparently it’s a shock for some people ― namely, journalist Glenn Greenwald, the buddy of NSA contractor turned Russian defector Edward Snowden ― to discover how the world has always worked. I’m truly sorry (as we native Canadians tend to be), but color me unfazed and maybe even slightly miffed.Greenwald worked with Brazil’s Globo newsp

Viewpoints Oct. 20, 2013

BERLIN ― The Russian-American plan to eliminate Syria’s chemical weapons ― now embodied in the United Nations Security Council Resolution 2118 ― may open a more constructive approach to ending the country’s civil war, because the Security Council is also demanding that the long-planned Geneva II conference on Syria convene as soon as possible. Rightly so: elimination of Syria’s chemical-weapons stockpiles and a political process to end the war must occur simultaneously.As a practical matter, eff

Viewpoints Oct. 20, 2013

An allegation has been made that at least one noncommissioned officer and three civilians attached to the military’s cyber warfare unit engaged in an online smear campaign against the opposition presidential candidate last year.The smear campaign, if proven true, would have breached political neutrality required of the military. Though denial was the initial response from the military, emerging circumstantial evidence is connecting the military personnel to negative comments made about Moon Jae-

Editorial Oct. 18, 2013

South Korea has decided to indefinitely postpone an event, scheduled for Oct. 31, to attract foreign investors to the industrial complex in Gaeseong across the Demilitarized Zone. The delay results from the lack of progress in the talks with North Korea on cross-border passage, communication and customs clearance.In deciding in August to reopen the industrial complex, whose operations had been suspended in April, Seoul and Pyongyang agreed to facilitate the border passage of personnel by control

Editorial Oct. 18, 2013

Two different narratives have been at play in Washington lately to explain what caused the government shutdown. In the first, House Republicans are to blame for trying to hold Democrats and the president hostage over a law that was duly passed by Congress. In the other, Democrats are to blame for their rigid refusal to compromise on Obamacare.But there’s a part of the story that seemingly has been lost in history: Democrats have already compromised on health care reform by adopting Obama/RomneyC

Viewpoints Oct. 18, 2013

Lawmakers have found that a significant proportion of the nation’s public organizations have a clause on job inheritance either in their collective bargaining agreements or in their bylaws.According to data disclosed by legislators on the Assembly’s Environment and Labor Committee, 65 of the nation’s entire 432 public institutions, including those affiliated with local governments, have a provision in their collective bargaining agreements that requires them to hire a family member of an employe

Editorial Oct. 17, 2013

One pressing task for President Park Geun-hye is to fill the top posts of the many state-run enterprises and other public organizations that have been left vacant for months. In June, she abruptly ordered the Cabinet ministries to halt the selection of candidates to lead the public entities under their wings. She was responding to a public outcry against parachute appointments.The public was riled up over the ministries helping their former officials land top positions at public entities. In res

Editorial Oct. 17, 2013

WASHINGTON ― The Turkish-Israeli relationship became so poisonous early last year that the Turkish government of Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan is said to have disclosed to Iranian intelligence the identities of up to 10 Iranians who had been meeting inside Turkey with their Mossad case officers. Knowledgeable sources describe the Turkish action as a “significant” loss of intelligence and “an effort to slap the Israelis.” The incident, disclosed here for the first time, illustrates the bitt

Viewpoints Oct. 17, 2013

If the world needs another reason to get serious about combating elephant poaching, here’s one: The attack by terrorists on Westgate Mall in Nairobi. Income from illegal ivory trafficking is a substantial funding source for the Shabab, the group that claimed responsibility for the attack.The connection between terrorism and wildlife smuggling is clear. An 18-month undercover investigation conducted by our groups found an indisputable financial trail between the illicit trade in ivory and rhino h

Viewpoints Oct. 17, 2013

The awarding of a Nobel Prize to three economists with divergent views on the working of markets highlights a troubling truth about the state of the discipline: We still don’t know nearly enough about why the prices of stocks, bonds and other assets move the way they do.If the economics profession wants to help the world avert ― or at least better survive ― financial crises, it will have to be more open to new ways of looking at this question.The recipients of this year’s Sveriges Riksbank Prize

Viewpoints Oct. 16, 2013