The Turkish protests have lasted for almost a month now, but one group has yet to check into Taksim Square so far. The Kurds, who make up almost 20 percent of Turkey’s population and are usually at the forefront of any anti-government protest, have been a no show. Why? The New York Times explains: The reticence […]

We just can’t win when it comes to environmental stewardship. After blithely polluting the skies for most of the 20th century, the US and Europe pushed through a number of laws in the 1970s-80s to clear the air. Now we’re finding out that in doing so, we’ve made more hurricanes. The FT reports: Until now, it was […]

If you’re looking for a job at Google, don’t rest on your Ivy League laurels.The company is taking a more data-centric approach to understanding what makes for successful hires, in lieu of focusing on degrees or transcripts. “G.P.A.’s are worthless as a criteria for hiring, and test scores are worthless—no correlation at all except for […]

Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan said on Saturday that “outside” forces are driving protests in Turkey as well as Brazil. He alleged that a conspiracy of various media and interests, aided by Facebook and Twitter, were to blame for unrest in both countries. “They are controlled from the same centre. They are doing their best […]

In a move that would have the world awash in rage and grief had Israel done it, Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi has tightened the screws on his country’s blockade of the Gaza Strip. Predictably, since it’s the Muslim Brotherhood government of Egypt and not Israel treating the Palestinians so pitilessly, nobody seems to care. Reuters […]

Ashin Wirathu’s serene face dominates the most recent cover of Time magazine, which calls it “The Face of Buddhist Terror.” Wirathu even calls himself the “Burmese Bin Laden.” But Burmese citizens, including President Thein Sein, have rushed to defend him against his treatment in the Time cover story. The article “damaged the reputation of Buddhism,” said the […]

As the Bloomberg era is ending in New York, teachers’ unions are licking their chops. More than ten years ago, Mayor Bloomberg wrested control of the public school system and embarked on an ambitious agenda of reform, instituting measures such as giving principals greater control over their budgets, making teacher tenure more difficult to obtain, closing […]

Howard University and several other historically black colleges and universities around the country have been facing serious financial shortfalls this year. Earlier this month, the vice chairwoman of Howard’s board of trustees sent a letter to trustees sounding the alarm on the university’s financial situation. Days later, the chairman of the board announced that there […]

The Muslim Brotherhood is failing to govern in Egypt, and its popularity is on the skids. Crime is up, jobs are as scarce as tourists and foreign investors, protests loom, and the Brotherhood is busy infighting as more radical forces edge toward center stage.That’s why this story is important: Egypt’s military is stepping back into […]

The White House continued to dither this week while the Middle East burned. This week’s essay looked at the Obama administration’s failures in Syria—its self-created problems of “red lines” and bold rhetoric not backed by action: The combination of grave and growing dangers in the Middle East with a lightweight policy response in Washington is […]