The West knows Vladimir Putin as a cold, calculating strategist, but in the run-up to this spring’s presidential elections, he has been putting on a different persona. Over the past few weeks, he’s made a number of generous promises, from increased salaries for public employees to cheaper healthcare. As a result, his once iffy poll […]

Americans should avoid any feelings of smug superiority about the problems in Europe’s periphery. It’s time for the U.S. to be worried about its “own peripheries”, according to the Financial Times. This FT report talks about underfunded pensions and state and local debt in the same terms it has used for Greece and Portugal.If the […]

The money has run out in Illinois. Despite having already mandated an income tax increase this year, the Democratic-controlled state legislature is facing the need for steep spending cuts. As Governor Pat Quinn said, “The truth is that over the past 35 years too many governors and members of the General Assembly have clung to […]

Syrian anti-Semite, Assad lackey, and 9/11 cheerleader Ali Ukla Ursan can add another accolade to his distinguished résumé: the Pushkin Medal, a top Russian cultural prize. The New York Times rehashes some of Ursan’s greatest hits: On Sept. 25, 2001, Mr. Ursan described his reaction to the collapse of the World Trade Center buildings two weeks earlier. […]

Australia is one of the pillars of America’s new Pacific strategy. It’s a staunch, long-time ally that has backed the United States ever since it realized in the middle of World War II that it could no longer rely on Britain.Lately, its politics have had a melodramatic air. To recap: Kevin Rudd was leader of […]

As if Europe weren’t already weary of bad news, here’s more: The Spanish Prime Minister is begging Brussels to ease his country’s deficit-reduction targets, only one day after an international agreement on a massive bailout fund for his government. Based on a recent European Commission forecast of declining growth in the coming year, Spain believes […]

Here’s an old joke: What would happen if the Soviet Union conquered the Sahara? Nothing for fifty years, and then a shortage of sand.A similar joke could be told about Venezuela, where Hugo Chávez has used his country’s vast reserves of oil to enrich himself and his cronies. Meanwhile ordinary Venezuelans live near old and […]

In the UK, where abortion based on sex selection is illegal, the Telegraph reports that doctors have been caught on film telling patients not to worry—they won’t abort and tell: Doctors at British clinics . . . admitted they were prepared to falsify paperwork to arrange the abortions even though it is illegal to conduct […]

The German economy has remained relatively stable amidst Europe’s ongoing cataclysm, but recent developments suggest that Germans shouldn’t get cocky about their good fortunes. The New York Times paints a grim picture of a slowing German economy strangled by over-regulation and buoyed above its neighbors only because of its renowned export sector.Much of the article’s […]

Officials in New York want to raise the minimum wage: The State Assembly speaker, Sheldon Silver, and Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg recently announced that they wanted to raise the state’s minimum wage to $8.50 an hour, or roughly $17,000 a year. It would be a 17 percent increase, and the first since the previous federal […]