Egypt: clean sweep for the civilians Egyptian President Muhammad Morsis spokesman did not mince words. He said that the retirement of all the senior military commanders in the country represented the completion of the Egyptian revolution. And guess what? The rest of the officer c..
Fate of Africa Good news from Africa: after two decades of bloody anarchy, Somalia is finally on the mend. There is something resembling a government coming into being in Mogadishu, with much help from African Union troops although the countrys most popular ..
Patriotic groupthink I havent been following the Olympics very closely this year. Its the first time I havent stayed up to watch at least a few hours of the broadcasts.
Pusan vs Busan, Sogang vs Seogang, and Peking vs Beijing In the year 2000, Korea changed Pusan to Busan (λ) because Pusan (Ǫ) sounds awful to Korean ears. Also, Inchon () became Incheon (õ). When Pusan became Busan, I said to myself, Finally, somebody has the sense to make it sound right. The..
Power of mockery How much do tyrants fear mockery? Consider the case of Belarus, often called the last dictatorship in the heart of Europe, where President Alexander Lukashenko has just fired his air force and border security chiefs because they did not stop a ..
Korea-Japan: time for outside mediation? There is an old Russian proverb that applies to current Japan-South Korea (ROK) relations: Forget the past and lose an eye; dwell on the past and lose both eyes! The Japanese, it would appear, are eager to forget the past, while the Koreans see..
Middle East after Assad BERLIN What will the Middle East look like once the Syrian civil war brings about the fall of President Bashar al-Assad, whose clan has ruled the country with an iron fist for more than 40 years? Given the recent dramatic turn of events that has..
Syria reaches tipping point UNITED NATIONS These are tumultuous times in Syria. Civil war has engulfed the country, fierce fighting plagues the capital of Damascus, a bomb blast decimated the ruling regimes top security chiefs, and the Arab League called on President B..
US Olympic uniform controversy UNITED NATIONS With the London Summer Olympics fast approaching, the eyes of America are on Team USA, or more precisely on the manufacturers labels on their uniforms. What looked like a proud sporting moment when designer Ralph Lauren unveiled..
Energy independence in interdependent world CAMBRIDGE When President Richard Nixon proclaimed in the early 1970s that he wanted to secure national energy independence, the United States imported a quarter of its oil. By the decades end, after an Arab oil embargo and the Iranian Revoluti..
Walking in anothers shoes They say you shouldnt judge someone until youve walked a mile in their shoes. For decades, I have rolled my eyes at just such a cliched viewpoint. Ive understood judgmental to be a synonym for being of firm convictions. I know youre su..
Chinas self-created problems LOS ANGELES China allegedly has at least 1.3 billion people residing within its current ample borders. (But has anyone actually ever counted?!!)
Electoral politics and Korea-Japan relations Recently, the controversy of the failure in signing an agreement with Japan on sharing intelligence information largely dominated the South Korean political discussion. The whole diplomatic fiasco ended with a sudden calling off by the Blue House a..
Can Korea solve household debt woes? Korea remains one of the best-performing advanced industrial economies this year despite the eurozone debt crisis and economic slowdowns in the U.S. and China. Its weak currency is preventing exports from falling further than they probably should h..
Europes winners and losers BERLIN Rarely is a high-flying country brought back down to earth in a single night, but that is precisely what happened to Germany recently. In both football (soccer) and politics, the country had come to embody an unseemly mixture of arrogance..
McCarthyism The Communist Party of the Soviet Union seized power through the 1917 revolution in Russia with the slogan of creating a perfectly equal society without classes. It meant the abolition of private ownership of property and, unlike socialism, not onl..
Weddings Im not a huge fan of weddings. Whenever someone discovers this, they react in disbelief. Some will condescend, Youre just pretending, all women love weddings, and others will wax poetic about the celebration of love and affirming the union i..
