Western reporters have had a few days to mull over the video of wailing North Koreans publicly displaying their grief.  Days and sleepless nights of prolonged analysis have led the Times to a shocking conclusion: this outpouring of grief for a murderous dictator may not have been entirely sincere: A day after North Korea announced […]

Something like eleven percent of the population still has a favorable view of Congress.  An appreciable percentage of those are probably Native Americans gloating as they contemplate the miserable mess the palefaces are making of their affairs, but except for hardcore America haters who like to watch the Congressional wrecking machine, the few people left […]

The online education movement continues to make strides — earlier this week it was electronic textbooks, today the Times announces that M.I.T. is expanding its online education program: While students at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology pay thousands of dollars for courses, the university will announce a new program on Monday allowing anyone anywhere to […]

Though much attention is still focused on succession and stability questions in North Korea, more trouble is brewing in Asia’s other problematic nuclear power: Pakistan’s ruling elite is in turmoil. Rumblings of military coup follow reports that the civilian government petitioned the US for help against the generals.“President Asif Ali Zardari has returned to the country to […]

In its December 2011 issue Christianity Today carried an interview with Craig Keener, a New Testament historian teaching at Asbury Theological Seminary in Wilmore, Kentucky. He is the author of a recent book, Miracles: The Credibility of the New Testament Accounts. Keener has a quarrel with most of his colleagues, who tend to dismiss these […]

The Battle of Madison may be over, but its ripple effects are still being felt across the country in states like Ohio and Maine. Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker was able to get his bills through the State House despite the spectacle of Democratic senators hiding in a pub across state lines, but in the process […]

At Via Meadia we’ve been saying for some time that the world underestimates the chances that the Obama administration will go to war with Iran over its nuclear program.After Defense Secretary Leon Panetta’s interview with CBS, it’s time for the world to reassess.  The administration, Secretary Panetta makes clear will not allow Iran to get […]

Amid the scramble in newsrooms and government offices around the world that followed Kim Jong-Il’s death, one important piece of news from Asia missed all the headlines.The real news in Asian politics yesterday, the kind of thing that will likely show up in the history books, was a quiet meeting announced by the State Department. […]

It turns out there is a scientific explanation for one of the great mysteries that perplex Americans everywhere: how the French can eat all that great food without getting fat.The answer, we learn from the NYT, isn’t the Mediterranean diet, the miraculous qualities of red wine or the healing effects of goose fat.  It’s drugs, […]

Life is getting unpleasant in the Kremlin these days.  Moscow is jittery over the national protests against the corruption and social failures of Putinocracy, and the fear that a new wave of democracy agitation (obviously manufactured in the State Department by the archfiend Hillary Clinton) could further inflame the Russian situation has the ex-KBG hacks […]