George Monbiot, one of the world’s leading environmentalists and a writer for the left-leaning British Guardian has an assessment of the Rio+20 environmental summit that tracks pretty closely with my own. Writes the anguished Monbiot, We know it’s rubbish, but we allow our hopes to be raised, only to witness 190 nations arguing through the […]

Does the quality and funding of a country’s universities directly correlate with its economic prosperity? A piece in the Wall Street Journal suggests that this question is increasingly up for debate.In a report issued last week, a committee of leaders from higher ed institutions and nonprofits warned that impending funding cuts for higher education threaten to […]

If you take the media at its word, things are heating up along the border between Egypt and Israel, where several Israelis and Palestinians have been killed in recent days.The recent outbreaks are the latest in a series of incidents along what was once a quiet frontier. Israel has complained of lawlessness and cross-border terrorist attacks […]

Ten short days ago, the $125 Spanish bank rescue plan was being hailed, briefly, by rattled European officials as a breakthrough that would stabilize the eurozone’s fourth largest economy.Now yields on Spanish 10 year bonds have passed 7 percent, the “magic number” that forced Greece, Ireland and Portugal to seek national bailouts, and the talk […]

It’s paywall protected, but this morning I have a piece in the Wall Street Journal looking at the geopolitical implications of Europe’s currency disaster.There’s nothing good to report; the currency meltdown is making Europe weaker and less consequential in the world in ways that seriously damage important American relationships and interests. Even in a best […]

Only over the past decade or two have Americans come to view the European Union as the principal symbolic organization of the continent. Throughout the Cold War, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, an alliance established in 1949 to balance against the communists, received most of our attention. Since the fall of the Soviet Union, however, […]

For most Americans, the so-called drone war is a no-brainer: maximum lethality delivered at low economic cost, with zero risk to American personnel—all buffered by the virtual-reality nature of a delivery system that keeps the consequences safely out of sight. That explains why a stunning 83 percent of the country supports President Barack Obama’s use […]

Northern Nigeria is back under curfew after a new wave of Christian-Muslim violence swept the Kaduna province on Sunday. The BBC reports that church bombings and the rioting that followed left at least 36 dead, and late reports raise the death toll to 50. From the BBC: Red Cross officials told the agency that more than […]

Syria is fast becoming a skull-splitting headache for the White House. The Obama administration dialed up its rhetoric on Syria in recent months, but it hasn’t matched U.S. words with action. Russia has noticed the chasm between U.S. words and will and has seen an opportunity: Introducing an unpredictable new element into the Syrian crisis, […]

The meltdown in Pakistan continues. One by one, its key institutions are drowning in a tidal wave of sleaze. The political parties lost all moral authority years ago; now judges and journalists are under scrutiny for dodgy dealings.The New York Times reports on these latest scandals, including corruption charges against the family of the chief justice […]