This week Pakistan’s new government threw its weight behind the effort to prosecute former military dictator Pervez Musharraf for treason. In 1999, Musharraf ousted then-Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif (who recently returned for a third term in office), and a military court sentenced him to life in prison on an assortment of charges including terrorism and […]

Student loan rates are set to double on Monday as US Senators failed to reach a compromise and headed home for the July 4 recess. But as the estimable Glenn Reynolds writes in the WSJ, the interest rate isn’t the real issue. None of the plans on offer—Republican, Democrat, or White House—will fix the core problem […]

China’s Foreign Minister issued a stern warning to neighboring countries today, saying that efforts to resist China’s territorial claims in the South China Sea are “futile” and countries that do so are “doomed.” The threat was timed to coincide with joint naval war games exercises by the US and the Philippines in the South China […]

America has a graduation problem. We encourage as many high school students as possible to enroll in college. But many of these students never make it to the finish line, leaving college with thousands of dollars of debt and little or no advantage in the job market. Eduardo Porter rehearses these grim dropout stats in the New York […]

Congress has been threatening to allow interest rates on federal student loans to double for a while now, but this time it looks like it’s actually going to happen. Unless Congress takes action now, hikes will take effect on July 1 for all future borrowers. Two groups of senators have unveiled two different plans to avert […]

Europe’s green policies have been an unmitigated disaster. The continent is having second thoughts on its misguided green policies, and it’s not hard to see why. By propping up uncompetitive solar and wind projects, Europe has driven prices up and driven energy-intensive industry away towards shale-flush America. By refusing to embrace the shale revolution, Europe has become […]

It’s an unusual scene: The Chinese government today welcomed South Korean President Park Geun-hye with a bouquet of flowers, an elaborate banquet, and the promise of a meeting with Xi Jinping. Across town, a “furtive, hastily arranged” meeting took place between Chinese officials and two North Koreans, a senior officer and a diplomat. The Norks, […]

After he started experiencing fainting spells in college, doctors told Eric Dishman that he had a confluence of rare diseases and that he would die in two years at the most. Refusing to accept this diagnosis, Dishman went looking for other opinions and treatments. Politico: Perhaps the most important step I took was having my genome sequenced. I’m lucky […]

The UK may have twice as much shale gas as previously thought, according to a new report. The British Geological Survey estimates that the UK may have 1,300 trillion cubic feet (Tcf) of shale gas, up from 623 Tcf in a previous EIA report. Even more encouraging, the British government released a slate of reforms […]

There are currently ten states whose pension liabilities are higher than total yearly revenues, according to a new Moody’s report on public pensions. The states in question included Colorado, Kentucky, New Jersey, Hawaii, and Connecticut. Worst of all was Illinois, where pension liabilities are more than twice as high as revenues. As Reuters reports, the culprit is the same […]