Another one bites the dust.  Sexual missteps and worse are among Washington’s most common career killers; the elite educational system in this country has essentially abandoned the task of providing moral and religious guidance to help bright, ambitious young people steer clear of these traps.Sad — from every point of view.

The protests in Syria just won’t stop. The Army is overstretched. Syria’s allies are turning their backs. The economy is collapsing; tourism is nonexistent. Unemployment has doubled. Reports suggest $20 billion has left the country. The holy month of Ramadan could put protesters out on the streets every day.So what can the House of Assad […]

From the NYT comes this gripping thriller:  “Hard Times Cause Rifts Among Mariachi Bands.”  The implications are huge!

This can’t have been a happy morning around the coffee urn at the White House.  The Washington Post carries several deeply disturbing stories that suggest events are not moving the president’s way.First, there’s this front pager on the ATF gunrunning scandal.  Internet addicts have watched this one bubble around for some time on the net […]

Things aren’t going well in Afghanistan: corruption, wrangling over the abuse aid money, fear that Afghan security forces aren’t up to filling the security vacuum that will be created by the withdraw of Western forces, and mounting criticism of American objectives for the country.It’s clearly time for the A-Team.Amb. Ryan Crocker was sworn in today as […]

HRH Charles, Prince of Wales, and heir to the British throne, is one of the world’s most prominent greens.He is also, according to Britain’s most authoritative researcher on alternative medicine, a “snake oil salesman” who sells quack herbal medicines that don’t work.Now personally I have no idea whether the Prince’s Duchy Herbals detox tincture cures […]

I have a short op-ed on the future of the Black middle class at the New York Times Room for Debate. One commenter writes “sir, your essay is poppycock…[Blacks need to use] emerging technologies that can build us into global entrepreneurs and not just American ones”.  Not quite sure there’s a point there, but it’s […]

From the always informative Futurepundit, good news on the environment.  Plastic, it turns out, can be made from sugarcane.  This could be more useful and more enviro-friendly than ethanol.Too early to know how practical it is, but ideas like this will do more for the earth than all the climate treaties yet proposed.

Lots of rotten news coming from South Africa these days.  Allegations of corruption swirl around President Zuma’s entourage.  The union federation demands an investigation of the leader of the ANC youth wing.  Judges are issuing writs and newspapers are writing scare headlines.The news is worrying bad — the corruption seems to be real and if […]

“Just talking is progress in India, Pakistan ties,” chirps Reuters merrily this morning.No, it isn’t.India and Pakistan have been talking on and off for years.  Mostly, they’ve been talking about the same thing: Kashmir.The US in particular is happy when they talk; a solution for Kashmir and a rapprochement between two principal heirs of the […]