Most Popular
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Ador CEO denies allegations, accuses Hybe of mistreating NewJeans
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Medical reform committee kicks off despite boycott from doctors
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10-man S. Korea lose to Indonesia to miss out on Paris Olympic football qualification
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Hybe-Ador feud should have limited effect on Hybe's overall performance: analysts
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DP leader says he will meet Yoon without conditions
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Over 9,000 hotline calls made by stalking victims in 2023
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Second Gimpo civil servant found dead, after apologizing for not finishing work
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[Hello India] Hyundai Motor vows to boost 'clean mobility' in India
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Monthly users on local streaming platforms outpace Netflix, Disney+
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US will take steps for three-way engagement on nuclear deterrence with S. Korea, Japan: Campbell
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[Walden Bello] No easy struggle for women
Women’s rights have been in the forefront of international concern over the last few weeks.Making the biggest headlines were the massive demonstrations in New Delhi and other cities in India provoked by the brutal gang-rape by six men of a 23-year-old physiotherapy student in a moving bus in the Indian capital. The crime, which saw the victim suffer extremely serious wounds in her genitals and intestines, proved to be the trigger for the release of popular anger that had built up over the years
Jan. 3, 2013
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End of the world as we know it and I feel fine
Most of us acknowledge that some of our most cherished beliefs are based on faith, not facts. Even so, it takes a lot to dislodge those beliefs. When we are confronted by contrary evidence, we may dig in even more deeply. Consider a cautionary tale, exotic to be sure, but helping to explain why evidence-challenged thinking persists in a lot of areas, including politics and business. Harold Camping, a Christian radio talk-show host, predicted that the world was going to end on May 21, 2011, with
Jan. 2, 2013
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[David Ignatius] China’s new hatchet man
WASHINGTON ― Who will have the world’s hardest job in 2013? There are many candidates for that role, but my nominee would be Vice Premier Wang Qishan, who has just been given the near-impossible assignment of combating corruption in China. China-watchers see Wang as a crucial player in the new Chinese government headed by Xi Jinping. It will fall to Wang, as the new head of the Communist Party’s Central Commission for Discipline, to crack the whip and stop the thievery before it devours China. W
Jan. 2, 2013
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Ten ways for Obama to remake the world
We could be nearing a golden hour in U.S. foreign policy, that rare moment when a newly reelected president theoretically has the experience and clout to make good things happen. As President Barack Obama told Russian President Dmitry Medvedev last March before an unanticipated open microphone, “This is my last election. After my election I have more flexibility.” We can think of many places more deserving of presidential flexibility than Russia, which is in such a state of pugnacious isolationi
Jan. 2, 2013
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The great bank debate
OXFORD ― Christine Lagarde, the International Monetary Fund’s managing director, recently said of the unfinished agenda for global financial-sector reform: “To start, we need concrete progress with the too-important-to-fail conundrum. We need a global-level discussion of the pros and cons of direct restrictions on business models.” Five years on from the start of the crisis, with the publication of the Liikanen report on European Union banking reform, that debate has finally begun.The Liikanen p
Jan. 2, 2013
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[Naomi Wolf] Putting an end to India’s deep-rooted rape culture
NEW YORK ― The crime seems incomprehensible. A 23-year-old physiotherapy student is dead, 12 days after having been raped for more than an hour by six men in a bus traveling on main roads in the Indian capital. Her internal injuries from the iron rod that her attackers used were so severe that doctors had to remove her intestines in their effort to save her life.Indians, it seems, have had enough. Dozens of large and increasingly angry demonstrations have been held to demand that the government
Jan. 2, 2013
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[Daniel Fiedler] End inefficient court processes
As war is the final political solution between countries unable to settle their disputes, lawsuits are the final legal solution between parties otherwise unable to settle their disputes. As with the causes of war, the underlying disputes in a lawsuit may have arisen over years or may be the result of one cataclysmic event.At one end of the legal range are personal injury cases over car accidents and medical malpractice, at the other end are intense multi-year multinational patent battles, such a
Jan. 1, 2013
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Rising life spans ― despite some unhealthy choices
There’s good news in a new and certifiable global trend: More elderly people are dying of cancer and heart disease.That may not sound like good news, and in one obvious sense it isn’t. But before you can die in old age of so-called “rich-country” ailments like these, you have to survive many decades. That so many people are doing so represents a huge achievement.“It shows that many parts of the globe have largely overcome infectious and communicable diseases as a pervasive threat, and that peopl
Jan. 1, 2013
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Benevolent billionaires should buy out Bushmaster
Business moguls who favor stricter gun-control laws ― among them Bloomberg LP founder and New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, financier George Soros and entertainment honcho David Geffen ― are in the unique position of being able to put their money where their mouths are, and with a single bold move can change the raging gun debate in a way that intransigent politicians cannot. These well-intentioned billionaires (and others) should buy Freedom Group Inc., the world’s largest gun manufacturer
Jan. 1, 2013
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Twitter saps productivity, Facebook makes you fat
Ever since the invention of the wheel in Mesopotamia around 3500 B.C., technological innovation has been improving our lives. Because new devices and processes help us produce more (output) with less (labor input), prices fall, real wages rise and we are all better off. If there is a free lunch in this world, it’s productivity growth. There is even an economic school of thought, known as real business cycle theory, which views technology shocks as the main driver of the business cycle: not the c
Jan. 1, 2013
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[Kim Seong-kon] Rise and shine in 2013, the Year of the Snake
Waking up in Seoul in 2013, I found a painting of an auspicious snake looking down at me from the new calendar hanging on the wall of my bedroom. Suddenly, it occurred to me that 2013 was the Year of the Snake. Soon my memory drifted to one fine day when I had encountered a cute baby snake in a bush on campus. The little snake was startled to see me and hurriedly hid behind a small rock, furtively shooting glances at me. The shy little baby snake was so cute that I almost caressed it. I have alw
Jan. 1, 2013
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View China as a partner, not a problem
In a few weeks, President Barack Obama and Vice President Joe Biden will be reinaugurated with great fanfare in Washington. Soon after that, in Beijing, Xi Jinping and Li Keqiang will ascend to the presidency and premiership of China. (China’s premier is the second-highest office but unlike the American vice president is more like the country’s chief operating officer, with the president as chief executive officer.) If our political leaders would play their cards right, the concomitant inaugurat
Dec. 30, 2012
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The billionaires’ long game
I keep hearing that the billionaires and big corporations that poured all that money into the 2012 election learned their lesson. They lost their shirts and won’t do it again. So we don’t need campaign finance reform.Baloney.It’s true their political investments didn’t exactly pay off this time around.Republican operative Karl Rove’s two giant political funds ― American Crossroads (a super PAC) and Crossroads Grassroots Policy Strategies (a so-called nonprofit “social welfare organization” that
Dec. 30, 2012
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New paradigm sought for changing chaebol
The Blue House will have a new tenant in February. President-elect Park Geun-hye, a conservative, won last month’s election against her liberal rival, Moon Jae-in. The close election proved that Koreans are politically divided, but united in their expectations as both candidates touted pretty much the same social and economic policies, but with differing emphasis and perspectives.One unifying theme of the campaign was the take on the future of chaebol, Korea’s family-owned conglomerates that con
Dec. 30, 2012
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Fed realigns mandate on inflation, employment
NEWPORT BEACH ― In a four-day period in mid-December, three seemingly unrelated developments suggested that modern central banking is in the midst of an historic change. The implications go well beyond academia and policy circles. To the extent that this shift gains momentum ― which appears likely ― it will affect economic performance, the functioning of markets, and asset-price valuations.The three developments began on Dec. 12 in the United States, where the Federal Reserve, led by Ben Bernank
Dec. 30, 2012
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Brave men and women who face up to danger
I want to pay tribute to a few brave men and women who fought in 2012 for dignity, justice, and peace in some of the world’s most troubled countries.My list is limited by space considerations. So I’ve chosen to focus on people I’ve been privileged to meet or whom I’ve learned about from contacts in their countries. What distinguishes them is that each has chosen to struggle, at great risk, for values that most of us take for granted ― though their odds of success are small.I’ll start with someon
Dec. 30, 2012
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[J. Bradford DeLong] U.S. set to jump off fiscal cliff
BERKELEY ― Unless something unexpected happens, the United States’ many legislated reductions in taxes over the past 12 years ― all of which have been explicitly temporary ― will expire simultaneously at the start of 2013. American tax rates will revert overnight to their Clinton-era levels.Some of these reductions were implemented to fight what was seen four years ago as a temporary downturn. Although their supporters wanted to make them permanent, claiming that they were temporary allowed for
Dec. 28, 2012
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Better nuclear bombs for a safer world
Is the U.S. getting ready to wage the Cold War again? If one believes the critics, that’s the aim behind a planned $10 billion modernization of the B61 nuclear bomb, the backbone of the Pentagon’s tactical nuclear arsenal. Actually, there are some other reasons for the upgrade: to reinforce global deterrence, to provide options against a range of future threats, and to make the U.S. stronger and safer. Achieving those goals is worth the money. As wonderful as the idea of a world without nuclear
Dec. 28, 2012
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NRA ‘solutions’ straight out of a Stallone movie
After a tragedy like the Sandy Hook Elementary School massacre in Newtown, Conn., the injection of anything short of seriousness into the subsequent public discourse about guns is touchy. But last week, the National Rifle Association blasted numerous rounds into that particular barrier with NRA Executive Vice President Wayne LaPierre’s mouth.The organization’s hysteric solution to gun violence in America is to put designated sitting ducks ― er, “armed police officers” ― in every American school.
Dec. 27, 2012
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[Park Sang-seek] Five major events of the world
The year 2012 is drawing to its end. Was it a happy or sad year? Will the year 2013 be a happy or sad year? Toward the end of each year major international news media select 10 world news events. The criterion for selection is usually newsworthiness. I have selected five events on the basis of the degree of seriousness and impact on international peace. They are the Arab spring; the Israel-Palestine conflict; the territorial disputes in Northeast Asia and the South China Sea; the leadership chan
Dec. 27, 2012