These days, all looks to be going well on the Korean Peninsula. Guard posts at the DMZ are being destroyed. Southern delegations and inspectors are going to the North to reopen offices and restore railroads. Gifts of mushrooms and tangerines are being exchanged. Images of the smiling North and South Korean leaders fill the news. Speaking the same language, President Moon vouches to world leaders that Kim Jong-un will keep his word to him and denuclearize, thus ushering in a new period of Korean

OPEC has lost what control of the oil market it ever had. The actions (or tweets) of three men -- Presidents Donald Trump, Vladimir Putin and Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Salman -- will determine the course of oil prices in 2019 and beyond. But of course they each want different things.While OPEC struggles to find common purpose, the US, Russia and Saudi Arabia dominate global supply. Together they produce more oil than the 15 members of OPEC. All three are pumping at record rates and each could ra

The lines of Chinese tourists eager to visit Mao Zedong’s mausoleum in the center of Beijing’s Tiananmen Square start building at 7 a.m., and the wait can be three hours. The tourist shops along one side of the square are filled with glossy pendants that feature Mao on one side and Chinese President Xi Jinping on the other.Those pendants are fixed in my mind on my return from my latest trip to China, as the clock ticks down to a critical meeting between Xi and President Trump at the Group of 20

There are many reasons the state prosecution should hasten its investigation into allegations that Gyeonggi Province Gov. Lee Jae-myung’s wife used Twitter posts to attack her husband’s political rivals, with some of the posts containing false information and defamatory comments. At stake is the governorship of the nation’s largest provincial government. If the prosecution’s investigation and consequent court trial result in the conviction of Kim Hye-kyung with a fine of 3 million won ($2,650) o

After World War II, the United States led the world in reducing protectionist barriers and establishing an open, rules-based trade system. That effort resulted in a half-century of the most rapid economic growth in human history. But US President Donald Trump’s administration is now reversing that progress. The protectionism that Trump has unleashed is contagious and will likely spread well beyond the industries that he wants to insulate from foreign competition.Consider imported steel, which th

Sooner or later, every president experiences fleeting feelings that he’s somehow accomplished the geometrically impossible feat of painting himself into a corner of his Oval Office.Along with the Marine band’s ceremonial “Hail to the Chief” and the military aide toting the nuclear-code “football,” feelings of entrapment come with the job.But these days, US President Donald Trump is looking, sounding and behaving as if he’s feeling like those white oval walls are closing in, a little more each da