Gideon Rachman argues in his latest column that despite tough times in Europe the continent is electing comedians, not fascists, to power. There’s something to the trend he’s identified: it isn’t the 1930s anymore, and we aren’t seeing the rise of thugs and genocidaires (except maybe in Greece). Rachman: Italy’s regional separatists, the Northern League, […]

A green activist named Chen Yuqian claims to have been beaten by a group of forty thugs for “using the internet” to publicize pollution in the Zhejiang province where he lives. We reported on a Chinese entrepreneur’s $32,000 offer to a local environmental official to swim in a polluted river; emboldened by the creativity of this […]

Employers are increasingly disappointed by the graduates available for hire, according to a survey conducted by The Chronicle and American Public Media’s Marketplace: Half of those surveyed…said they had trouble finding recent graduates qualified to fill positions at their company or organization. Nearly a third gave colleges just fair to poor marks for producing successful employees. And […]

Once a closed economy run by a military junta where only Chinese firms were comfortable doing business, the newly “transparent” and “democratic” Burma has been freed from sanctions and is now open to all comers. And boy are they coming.Attracted by Burma’s storied wealth in natural resources like gemstones, lumber, oil and gas, foreign firms […]

Tomorrow’s school board elections in Los Angeles have become the latest battleground in the national school reform effort. Outside groups have spent almost $4.4 million on the elections. Supporting the reformers’ slate of candidates are New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg and Students First, the national advocacy organization of education reformer extraordinaire and former DC School Chancellor […]

More than 110,000 participants are taking part in the third-annual Telework Week, an event hosted by the public-private partnership Mobile Work Exchange to improve awareness of the myriad benefits of teleworking. Participants have pledged to work from home at least one day this week, and the organization has seen a 55 percent increase in participation since last […]

Attempts to remake the GOP in the wake of 2012 have thus far been discouraging. Most recently, CPAC, a conservative confab attended by some of the biggest names in the GOP, made headlines for snubbing New Jersey Governor Chris Christie and banning a pro-gay rights group. For a movement that needs to gain support from […]

Bad news for wind farms: the earth may have far less wind capacity than previously thought, according to a new study from professors at Harvard University and the University of North Carolina. Up to this point, most limits to wind power have centered on our inability to efficiently harness it, permit it, and site it. […]

Just two months in to the Kansas Red Dawn, doubts are being raised about the Tea Party dream. Though Republicans have total control of state politics, Governor Sam Brownback is facing resistance from disgruntled voters and a skeptical judiciary. The FT takes notice: A court ruled in January the government was underfunding education and ordered […]

The University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton India Economic Forum was set to feature Narendra Modi, the governor of Gujarat state in west India, as a keynote speaker. Yesterday, however, Modi’s speech was cancelled after students, teachers, and “multiple stakeholders” in the wider university community denounced him.“This is the same politician who was refused a diplomatic visa […]