BLOG… Post #114: The Panama Papers and the 1% 15 Apr 201627 Feb 2017 One of the many tools at the disposal of multinational corporations (MNCs) for maximizing profits and undermining state sovereignty is moving operations to low-tax countries. Global companies do not simply…
American Politics and the World… Post #109: Donald Trump—From One Tyrant to Another 3 Mar 201627 Feb 2017 One thing I discovered long ago about tyrants: they love other tyrants. They’re a mutual admiration/suffering society. When one succeeds by extinguishing dissent, the others applaud; and when one falls,…
BLOG… Post #106: Deadlock: North Korea’s Nuclear Test and US Policy 2 Feb 201627 Feb 2017 North Korea continues to rattle the cages of both friend and foe. Despite near-universal condemnation of its fourth nuclear test and a deplorable human rights record, Kim Jong-un defiantly disregards…
BLOG… Post #93: A Tale of Two Visitors 28 Sep 201527 Feb 2017 What a strange week it was: Pope Francis arriving in the east and President Xi Jinping arriving in the west. One had just come from preaching in Cuba in the…
BLOG… Post #89: China’s Insecurity 27 Aug 201527 Feb 2017 Several developments in China over the past few weeks have shown us a country quite different from the one often portrayed by outsiders—an emerging superpower, with global economic reach and…
American Politics and the World… Post #76 – TPP: A Deeply Flawed Partnership 4 May 201527 Feb 2017 (Note: A longer version of this post was subsequently published at http://japanfocus.org/-Mel-Gurtov/4318/article.html.) The American people have become used to government trickery in foreign affairs—wars and interventions based on lies and…
BLOG… Post #75 – India’s Shame, and the World’s 23 Apr 201527 Feb 2017 A democracy is supposed to have the advantage of affording people of any social class, gender, or religious or ethnic group the opportunity to advance. In contrast with authoritarian political…
BLOG… Post #62 – Human Rights: The Rising Record of Abuses 12 Jan 201527 Feb 2017 The terrorist attacks in Paris and the ongoing abductions of Boko Haram in Nigeria bring to mind this fact of life: systematic, large-scale abuses of human rights are on the…
BLOG… Post #54 – Is North Korea Having a Coming-Out Party? 18 Nov 201427 Feb 2017 Considering the overwhelming margin by which a UN General Assembly committee voted on November 18 to condemn North Korea for human-rights violations, one might think that establishing a stable relationship…
BLOG… Post #53 – AR5: Another Urgent Report on Climate Change 12 Nov 201427 Feb 2017 When we consider benchmarks that will help explain why the world ignored dire warnings of climate change, we will want to dwell on AR5, the fifth assessment report of the…
In the Human Interest - Mel Gurtov 