One of America’s closest allies claims to have unimpeachable evidence that President Obama’s “red line” in Syria has been crossed…several times. The FT reports that France has examined samples obtained from a Damascus suburb and from Saraqeb in the north, and concluded beyond any shred of doubt that the regime has targeted rebel forces with […]

The IMF’s growth forecast for Germany has just been cut in half due to troubles created by failing countries in the EU—not that the forecast was all that spectacular to begin with. In April, the IMF had predicted that the German economy would grow by 0.6 percent this year, but that already meager number is now down […]

On May 22, 2013,  Religion News Service reported on the morning homily delivered on that day by Pope Francis I. There has, understandably, been absorbing media interest in the new pontiff, from the fact that he continues to live in a guesthouse rather than in the splendid apartment available to him, to his having eschewed […]

New York Governor Andrew Cuomo seems to understand these days that the blue social model is a recipe for economic decline. The FT reports that he has proposed making certain locations in upstate New York and elsewhere “tax-free” to boost the state’s lagging economy. Upstate New York in particular has fallen behind New York City, […]

In November 2011, we ran a story about a pair of teen rowers from Episcopal Academy in suburban Philadelphia who gave up a race in order to stick around a rival boat whose rowers had fallen into the water. The two young men stayed until the others were safe and then rowed on to finish the […]

President Obama signed an executive order yesterday to levy a ninth round of sanctions on Iran, this time on the country’s currency and auto sector. The stated goal is to render the Iranian rial “unusuable” outside of Iran and to bring the country’s car industry to a grinding halt. But while the targets of these […]

Brussels often seems to busy itself with matters silly and bizarre, but the European Commission may finally be taking action on a worthwhile goal: fixing the EU’s broken and destructive fisheries policy. European subsidies for fishermen have frequently found their ways into the pockets of those caught illegally depleting stocks to dangerous, unsustainable levels. The FT reports […]

The US Embassy in Cairo is warning Americans to stay away from the Egyptian pyramids. This is bad news for Egypt’s tourism industry: Vendors at Egypt’s pyramids who are desperate to make money in a deepening economic crisis are using aggressive and even violent means to get tourists to give them some business, frequenters of […]

American high-speed rail boosters often yearn that the rail networks of Europe and China could be brought to our shores. A look across the pond suggests that some of these “model” high-speed rail systems aren’t doing so hot. Consider the Netherlands, which is now dealing with the fallout of its own botched high-speed rail project.The […]

Over 4,000 Hezbollah fighters have taken position around Aleppo, according to sources in the Free Syrian Army. Large numbers of Hezbollah fighters are already battling Syrian rebels in and around Qusayr. Reports suggest as many as 75 Hezbollah fighters have been killed in that battle so far, the highest death toll for the “Party of […]