The challenger came in well-prepared and displayed an impressive command of the issues. He was sharp, energetic, and direct. Time and again, he corrected the President, politely but firmly pointing out that his proposals were being misrepresented. He gave a strong closing statement, and after it all ended, the pundits were in agreement that he […]
In 1889, two years after an eccentric American millionaire established the European edition of The New York Herald, the precursor of the International Herald Tribune, Rudyard Kipling dined with some British businessmen in Hong Kong. The imperial rulers of China, most recently humiliated by France, had reluctantly started to modernize their vast domain; and British […]
Until recently, Beijing’s policy in Afghanistan could be characterized as masterful inactivity: It sat on the sidelines of a war that it wanted neither side to win. But the late September visit by security chief Zhou Yongkang, the first by a senior Chinese leader in almost five decades, is the most visible sign that the U.S. 2014 […]
The past two weeks have probably been the most high-profile weeks for Myanmar in the United States since the uprisings and crackdowns in Myanmar in 1988. The much-awaited visit of Daw Aung San Suu Kyi drew crowds that could be compared, in some ways, only to visits of Nelson Mandela and the Dalai Lama. And […]
THE whiff of agrarian reform has hung over North Korea since early summer when DailyNK, a Seoul-based defectors’ website, reported a plan to allow farmers to sell more of their harvest at market prices rather than lower, state-set ones. This week it grew stronger after two Western news agencies reported that farmers would be free […]
Africa is more important than ever to the United States. The continent, home to six of the world’s ten fastest-growing economies, is booming. And democracy has become the African norm rather than the exception. This year alone, no fewer than fifteen sub-Saharan countries will hold elections. With their combination of liberal politics and market economics, […]
In baseball, a game without a clock, each player on a team that is behind by a bunch of runs is advised to “stay within yourself.” That baseball lingo means: Do not try to do too much. Instead, get ’em on, get ’em over, get ’em in. There are no five-run home runs. Small, incremental gains matter […]
Fifty-two years ago, the United States and Japan signed the Treaty of Mutual Cooperation and Security. Forged just 15 years after a brutal, racially charged war between the two nations, the treaty was an exercise in realpolitik. It was written with an eye toward not only Japan‘s security but the containment of communism across Asia. The […]
It is human nature to want leaders we can admire and emulate, and who can inspire us. With the recent death of Vaclav Havel and the passing of Nelson Mandela into a long twilight, there is only one global figure who nearly universally embodies aspirations for freedom and human dignity around the world. She is […]
There is more to be said for President Obama’s Middle East policy than Shadi Hamid allows. While Hamid focuses on the gap between unrealistic expectations and real policy outcomes, the fact remains that in the space of two and a half years, between the president’s Cairo speech and the withdrawal of U.S. combat forces in […]
