Conflict between the two Sudans has escalated over the past few days. John Campbell at the Council on Foreign Relations sheds some light on what’s happening: Last week, Sudan (Khartoum) president al-Bashir escalated his rhetoric against South Sudan (Juba) in the aftermath of the latter’s forces occupying an oil-rich region, Heglig, inside Sudan’s borders. Al-Bashir has characterized […]

While selling his healthcare overhaul, Obama repeatedly reassured skeptics with a promise: If you like your current plan, you can keep it. Some workers may soon find out this isn’t exactly true. As companies, particularly small businesses, face rising healthcare costs under the new law, consultants are beginning to advise them to drop healthcare when […]

Here at Via Meadia, California has received considerable attention for the poor handling and shaky finances of its state pension funds. Yet California is hardly alone in these problems, and recent news out of Louisiana suggests it may not even be the worst. Three major public pension funds put money in a fly-by-night enterprise—and now […]

Are the sins of the father being visited upon the son? The Bo Xilai saga swirling through the top echelons of Chinese politics has reached the manicured lawns of Harvard, where Bo’s son, Bo Guagua, is enrolled in the Kennedy School of Government. Guagua has attracted significant media attention of late, most of which has centered […]

Turkey and Iraq are accusing each other of meddling in one another’s internal affairs in a diplomatic spat that could have wide ramifications across the Middle East.Baghdad is supremely unhappy with the warm welcome Turkey gave to Tariq al-Hashemi, a former Iraqi vice president who barely escaped being arrested after Prime Minister Nouri Maliki’s government accused him of […]

For decades, China’s rulers have successfully convinced foreigners to pay no attention to the men behind the curtain; now the Bo Xilai saga is tearing down that curtain completely. The latest bombshell comes from the New York Times, which has revealed that Bo ran an extensive wiretapping operation that included top Communist Party officials. Not even President Hu […]

Two weeks ago, North Korea earned the jeers of the world after launching a missile that fell into the sea within 90 seconds. Undeterred, it has continued celebrations of Kim Il-sung’s 100th birthday with a display of massive new missiles loaded on “the largest mobile launch vehicles North Korea has ever unveiled.”Perhaps the spectacle could […]

It’s a tragic failure that, after a decade of close U.S. diplomatic engagement with South and Central Asia, the media does not provide better coverage of a country of such pivotal importance. “Yes, Pakistan reality is complex,” Anatol Lieven writes in Foreign Policy, but “Western news outlets and academics must examine yet again their chronic tendency to analyze developments […]

Obama expanded the controversial “signature strikes” drone program into Yemen this month, where drone strikes can now be authorized even when the identity of the potential victims is unknown. The Washington Post reports that this program has already killed its first target: Mohammad Said al Umda, an al-Qaeda operative who received extensive training in Afghanistan […]

A new Rasmussen poll has a startling finding that could turn the blue ideology on its head. Findings released Wednesday indicate that a full 50 percent of likely voters believe that government regulation of the economy makes society less fair, compared to only 22 percent who believe that government intervention will lead to a fairer […]