This past January, San Jose State University excitedly announced a partnership with the MOOC start-up Udacity, only to find itself wiping some egg off its face after the first semester of online offerings went poorly, with less than half of the students passing the end-of-semester exam. The university put the program on hold, and MOOC […]

The SEC is investigating JP Morgan for bribery over reports that the company has been giving jobs to the children of powerful officials in order to win business in China. A recent examination of the company’s “Sons and Daughters” program, which was designed to prevent nepotism, found that the program instead did the opposite, providing […]

This is a guest post by Adam Garfinkle, editor of The American Interest. It is cross-posted from his blog elsewhere on this site. Be sure to bookmark his page!It is often remarked, mainly by frustrated parents and disrespected teachers, that two wrong do not make a right. But then what do they make? The scolds never […]

The proposed Keystone XL pipeline would increase production in Canada’s oil sands by 36 percent, according to a new report released jointly by four prominent green groups on Thursday. The pipeline, which would bring oil extracted from Alberta’s tar sands down to American refineries along the Gulf coast, is currently in limbo, awaiting White House approval.President Obama […]

India’s currency slide was halted today, but hit a new record low on Tuesday. At 67 rupees to the dollar (compared to the record low of 68.8), it’s not a dramatic shift, but is still a good sign. Reuters has the details: The Indian rupee rebounded on Thursday from a record low as the central […]

Another day, another Russia-Eastern Europe stand-off involving an antagonistic Putin flexing his energy muscle. This time, it’s Belarus taking the hit: its supply of Russian oil will be cut by roughly 25 percent.So what happened? Belarus arrested the CEO of the Russian potash firm Uralkali on Monday after the company pulled out of a “trade […]

In January, Congress told the Obama administration to cut more than $500 million per year in federal funding for “excessive” dialysis drug payments. Now over a hundred of the congressmen who voted for the original reductions have reversed themselves, signing a letter to the Medicare administrator asking for the cuts to be reconsidered. The Times reports: The […]

Welcome to North Korea, where you can be executed by machine gun for violating pornography laws. That at least is the official reason why the former girlfriend of Kim Jung-Un, North Korea’s young leader, and 11 of her colleagues in the Unhasu Orchestra were executed this month, according to South Korean media.Hyon Song-wol, a singer in […]

Pundits across the spectrum continue to hawk accountable care organizations (ACOs) as the solution to our health care cost woes. Today it’s Jenny Gold, arguing at Wonkblog that ACOs could be the cost-control “unicorn” we’ve been looking for all this time. Gold is pivoting off a new study that found “spillover effects” from a Massachusetts ACO: not only […]

San Bernardino just received the judicial go-ahead to declare bankruptcy more than a year after its initial bankruptcy filing. The ruling, delivered by a federal bankruptcy court on Wednesday, concludes a long legal battle between the city and Calpers, which was fighting to keep the city out of bankruptcy in order to keep its funds […]