A little-noticed disclosure resulting from the American military assault on Osama bin Laden’s home in Pakistan ought to be throwing a bright spotlight on a serious dilemma for the United States.Before they left, Navy Seals blew up the stealth helicopter that crashed just outside bin Laden’s house. But the tail section remained intact, studded with design elements of its stealth technology, somethi

A panicky Saudi Arabia has now openly seized the banner of outspoken opposition to Iran across the Muslim world, surpassing even Washington’s long and obsessive Iran-centered interpretation of Middle East events. Riyadh is perpetuating a false ― and hence dangerously misleading ― reading of key regional issues.The Saudi Kingdom grows understandably fearful as “stable” autocratic rule in the region

David Mamet, the acclaimed playwright known for characters that drop the F-bomb at every opportunity, has dropped the ultimate bomb on his fans and the creative community: He is no longer a “brain-dead liberal” but rather a “newly minted conservative.”This revelation is spelled out in his new book, “The Secret Knowledge: On the Dismantling of American Culture,” which hit stores last week. Accordin

President Obama is mulling an executive order to force big government contractors to disclose their political spending. He should issue it immediately. But he should go further ― banning all political activity by companies receiving more than half their revenues from the U.S. government.Consider Lockheed Martin, the nation’s largest contractor. It’s received more than $19 billion in federal contra

NEW YORK ― Sooner than expected, the International Monetary Fund will have a new managing director. For more than a decade, I have criticized the fund’s governance, symbolized by the way its leader is chosen. By gentlemen’s agreement among the majority shareholders ― the G8 ― the managing director is to be a European, with Americans in the number two post and at the head of the World Bank.The Euro

The third Seoul International Forum for Literature, which took place at Kyobo Conference Hall two weeks ago, was a literary festival for writers from all over the world. Under the theme, “The Globalizing World and the Human Community,” 14 celebrated international writers including two Nobel laureates, Le Clezio and Gao Xingjian, joined 31 representative Korean writers to discuss what to write and