Most Popular
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'Super Rich in Korea' will leave viewers appreciating Korea more: producers
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Probe of first lady on Dior bag allegations set to begin
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Top prosecutor pledges 'speedy, strict' probe into first lady's luxury bag allegations
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Indonesia’s KF-21 fighter jet deal cut back -- what’s next?
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[KH Explains] Can tech firms' AI alliances take on Nvidia?
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Police seek arrest warrant for med student who killed girlfriend
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Local filmmakers criticize ‘The Roundup: Punishment’ monopoly of screens
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[Grace Kao, Meera Choi] Has money displaced romance on dates?
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Korean battery makers heave sigh of relief over 2-year IRA reprieve
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Over 80,000 millionaires, 20 billionaires in Seoul: report
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Transatlantic cooperation in missile defense
BRUSSELS ― An American ship sailing into a Spanish naval base this week is making history. The arrival of the USS Donald Cook from Norfolk, Virginia, to its new home port in Rota, on Spain’s Atlantic coast, marks the first time that a U.S. Navy ship equipped with the high-tech Aegis ballistic missile-defense system will be permanently based in Europe.The USS Donald Cook is the first of four U.S. Navy destroyers that, with around 1,200 sailors and personnel, will play a central role in NATO’s mis
Feb. 14, 2014
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[Robert B. Reich] Why did we forget lessons?
Why has America forgotten the three most important economic lessons we learned in the 30 years following World War II?Before I answer that question, let me remind you what those lessons were:First, America’s real job creators are consumers, whose rising wages generate jobs and growth. If average people don’t have decent wages, there can be no real recovery and no sustained growth.In those years, business boomed because American workers were getting raises and had enough purchasing power to buy w
Feb. 13, 2014
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Student loans: Middle-class kids get hammered
Last October, in between arguments over the debt ceiling, the federal government somehow found time to send me an email. My student loan payment was 70 days past due, the message read, so the government had negatively reported me to each major credit bureau and would continue to report me until my account was brought current.I’m betting the government sent out a lot of those letters to people like me: college graduates from middle-class families who didn’t qualify for much in the way of scholars
Feb. 13, 2014
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[June HL Wong] School bullies triumph in the wake of apathy
Public sentiment, coupled with government action, can make a difference in protecting innocent children from bullies.The news hit me like a thunderbolt. T. Kavinraj, a 13-year-old Malaysian student, was driven to suicide by bullies in his school. He drank pesticide and died a painful death at a clinic in Semenyih, Selangor, on Saturday.I am horror-stricken and deeply saddened because we have all collectively failed this young boy. Despite The Star’s anti-bullying campaign that we launched last y
Feb. 13, 2014
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China-Taiwan meeting marks ‘new era’ in cross-strait ties
The relationship between China and Taiwan has entered “a new era,” the island’s top official overseeing mainland affairs declared at the first government-to-government meeting between the two sides.Wang Yu-chi, chairman of Taiwan’s Mainland Affairs Council, on Tuesday told his mainland counterpart Zhang Zhijun, director of China’s Taiwan Affairs Office, that simply sitting across the table from each other and formally discussing affairs of mutual interest marks a “historic moment” for cross-stra
Feb. 13, 2014
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Sharia for non-Muslims: Between respect, coercion
Aceh is commonly associated with conflict, tsunamis, peace and sharia law. The latter has remained an interesting topic of discussion, if not a source of controversy, among the public as well as policymakers.Political upheavals that plagued Aceh for about three decades have earned it special autonomy, which eludes almost all regional administrations in the country. Thanks to its status, Aceh is the only province in Indonesia invested with the right to enforce sharia law along with the Criminal C
Feb. 13, 2014
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[Cass R. Sunstein] Is it even better to win bronze than silver?
Imagine that for most of your life, you have been preparing for the Olympics. You are intensely competitive, and you badly want to win. But you know that in your event, only one person can win Olympic gold, and that only three can bring home a medal. Silver is better than bronze, of course; it’s great to be third in the world, but it’s even better to be second.Or is it?Research suggests that in the Olympics, those who finish third are likely to be a lot happier than those who finish second. The
Feb. 12, 2014
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Infrastructure attacks are cause for concern
PARIS ― At a time when many of us have become fixated on U.S. intelligence agencies’ “big data” programs, authorities are becoming aware of a much more insidious kind of threat ― one that could successfully exploit the growing blind spot created by our overreliance on technology.Jon Wellinghoff, the former chairman of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, told the Wall Street Journal that an April 2013 attack by multiple gunmen on Pacific Gas and Electric’s Metcalf power station in San Jose,
Feb. 12, 2014
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Germany’s Pyrrhic victory
BERLIN ― The German Constitutional Court has ruled against the European Central Bank’s pledge to buy potentially unlimited quantities of distressed eurozone countries’ government bonds, and has called on the European Court of Justice (ECJ) to confirm its decision. Until that happens, the “outright monetary transactions” (OMT) scheme is effectively dead, weakening the ECB’s ability to act as an effective and credible financial-market backstop at a time when European governments remain unwilling t
Feb. 12, 2014
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Outright monetary infractions, not transactions
MUNICH ― The German Constitutional Court has delivered its long-awaited decision on the European Central Bank’s “outright monetary transactions” program. Since its launch in 2012, the OMT program has allowed the ECB to buy, if necessary, unlimited amounts of troubled eurozone countries’ government bonds, provided the affected countries subscribe to the rules of Europe’s rescue fund, the European Stability Mechanism.Thousands of Germans appealed to the Constitutional Court against the OMT program
Feb. 12, 2014
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[William Pesek] No sex for Japan’s sexists
Where do they find these people? That question is surely on the minds of many Japanese women today, who have good reason to wonder how Yoichi Masuzoe squeaked into public office even after leaving a sordid paper trail of sexist comments.Did you know that menstruation makes women unfit for governing? Or that female politicians are “middle-aged hags”? These are just a couple of theories attributed to Tokyo’s new governor. You’d think a former health minister would be slightly more attuned to gende
Feb. 11, 2014
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Bill Gates ― the world is better than ever
Bill Gates wants you to feel much better about the future of mankind. Things are looking up, he says, way up.“By almost any measure, the world is better than it has ever been,” Gates wrote in his annual letter chronicling the work of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, through which he plans to give away most of the fortune he made from Microsoft.“People are living longer, healthier lives. Many nations that were aid recipients are now self-sufficient,” he wrote. “By 2035, there will be almost n
Feb. 11, 2014
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[Kim Seong-kon] Takano Kazuaki’s ‘Genocide’ a page-turning novel
Takano Kazuaki’s novel “Genocide” is a page-turner. Like Michael Bay’s fast-paced movies, Takano’s novel is so action-packed and thrilling that I could not put it down until I finished the last page. Takano’s experience studying film in L.A. and working with renowned director Kihachi Okamato has undoubtedly shaped his mesmerizing narrative technique. Indeed, the pleasure of reading “Genocide” primarily comes from its beautiful merging of literature and film; the novel manages to explore deep lit
Feb. 11, 2014
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For better or for worse, women reach foul-language equality
WASHINGTON ― The recent brief dust up (let’s hope it’s brief) over Assistant Secretary of State Victoria Nuland’s use of the F- word as an epithet aimed at the European Union does highlight the dramatic change of culture in women in public life, including the highest ranks of the government.While this is a scene that always has been dominated by men, more and more women are breaking through the vaunted glass ceiling to assume important roles in public and corporate affairs. In the process, howev
Feb. 11, 2014
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Hollande’s vacuous ideological rebranding
To the French, the Francois Hollande who arrived in the U.S. for a state visit Tuesday sounds quite different from the man they elected president 21 months ago.Back then, he castigated the world of finance as being “my real enemy,” promised to upend European economic austerity, and proudly declared: “I am a socialist.”Today, he has made peace with the banks and is advocating a new business-friendly plan to reduce the cost of social programs for employers. Rather than expanding the economy, he ha
Feb. 11, 2014
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[Park Sang-seek] Where are Korean intellectuals?
In South Korea today, all kinds of extremism are rampant. They are instigated by two extreme political forces: conservative and progressive. On the other hand, the print and electronic mass media is also divided into the two opposing ideological camps and is trying to “indoctrinate” the general public. Under these tense circumstances, ordinary people are confused and easily manipulated by these political forces and the mass media. These extremist conservative and progressive forces blame each ot
Feb. 10, 2014
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Why there’s no outcry over inequality in U.S.
People ask me all the time why we don’t have a revolution in America, or at least a major wave of reform similar to that of the Progressive Era or the New Deal or the Great Society.Middle incomes are sinking, the ranks of the poor are swelling, almost all the economic gains are going to the top, and big money is corrupting our democracy. So why isn’t there more of a ruckus?The answer is complex, but three reasons stand out.First, the working class is paralyzed with fear it will lose the jobs and
Feb. 10, 2014
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[Joseph E. Stiglitz] U.S. economic malaise caused by flawed policies
NEW YORK ― Soon after the global financial crisis erupted in 2008, I warned that unless the right policies were adopted, Japanese-style malaise ― slow growth and near-stagnant incomes for years to come ― could set in. While leaders on both sides of the Atlantic claimed that they had learned the lessons of Japan, they promptly proceeded to repeat some of the same mistakes. Now, even a key former U.S. official, the economist Larry Summers, is warning of secular stagnation.The basic point that I ra
Feb. 10, 2014
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Will Hollande make American women swoon?
Yes, yes, many important economic and foreign policy issues await discussion by the leaders of the U.S. and France during President Francois Hollande’s state visit to the White House on Tuesday.But in their appearances together and at the dinner in the Frenchman’s honor, one question will cross many people’s minds: What in the world do women see in him?This isn’t a question that would be asked about the buff and almost ostentatiously uxorious Barack Obama. We’re talking about the “short man with
Feb. 10, 2014
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Bangladesh’s democracy stands at a crossroads
BRUSSELS ― In the course of just a few weeks, Bangladesh’s fragile democracy ― which had made substantial social and economic progress in recent years ― has deteriorated dramatically. The general election on Jan. 5, which Bangladesh’s Western partners had hoped would consolidate its democratic credentials, was marred by violent protest and the refusal by the European Union and the United States to send observers, following the decision by the Bangladesh National Party, the country’s main opposit
Feb. 10, 2014