Over the weekend, President Donald Trump shared some thoughts on immigration that strongly suggest he either isn’t paying much attention to current events or he’s just trying to stir up his core supporters again in the face of congressional inaction and negative attention in the media. Either is a possibility; a combination of both is a probability. If he can denounce dark-skinned immigrants, the Mexican government and Democrats in one fell tweet, this is a president who is willing to put in the

Getting in a trade war with China or anyone else is economically suicidal, a way to disrupt everything and anything, and here is hope that what we are really seeing is the art of the deal. What you do is make egregious demands and then back down as the other side sees the hurt of obstinance and the benefit of concessions.　Maybe that’s what the Trump administration is really up to in its talk about $60 billion worth of tariffs on China, and there are signs of such a thing. China, in addition to s

A reconciliatory mood is growing fast between the two Koreas, raising hopes that it will have a positive effect on the upcoming series of high-level talks on denuclearizing North Korea. The mood, which is expected to continue at least until the summit between President Moon Jae-in and North Korean leader Kim Jong-un on April 27, was highlighted by a South Korean art troupe’s visit to the North. The 160-member troupe, which returned home Wednesday, held two concerts in Pyongyang, marking the firs

Signs of chaos looming over waste pileup in the Seoul area have disappeared under the surface -- for now.Recycling companies on Monday decided to overturn their previous decision to not collect plastic bags, plastic bottles and polystyrene foam or Styrofoam from Sunday.　Startled at the prospect of a bigger crisis over waste buildup and an outpouring of complaints and criticism, the government hurriedly contacted the companies and persuaded them to resume collection.　But their refusal of collecti

People are uncomfortable with the term “privileged.”　Several readers took offense recently when I differentiated between privileged youths and underprivileged youths in a column about the March for Our Lives.　“Categorizing and generalizing of this type are just veiled forms of discrimination and/or racism,” one man wrote.　I’d like to take this opportunity to set the record straight.　If you are a white person in America, you were born privileged. That’s just a fact.　It’s nothing to be ashamed of.

Without North Korea’s credible threats to destroy American cities, there would likely be no current crisis on the Korean Peninsula. North Korea could have continued to quietly build its nuclear arsenal and missile technology, as it had for decades. South Korea would have accepted their bad brother, who it considered full of bluster but harmless, per Presidents Roh Moo-hyun, Kim Dae-jung, and the narrative on the street. China, the perfect enabler, would have continued to look the other way, happ

Vladimir Putin has spent years trying to divide the West by undermining elections, invading neighbors and aggressively using Russian oil and gas as a ham-handed bargaining tool. These concerted and clever efforts have suddenly, however, revealed the New Putin: Despite his best efforts and plans, he’s become a uniter, not a divider of the West.　Early 2018 had Putin heading towards a staggering, but not surprising, electoral victory against dead and disqualified opposition candidates. This dominan

Early last month, shortly after China’s Communist Party ended term limits on presidential rule --effectively making President Xi Jinping “president for life”-- President Trump joked to donors, “I think it’s great. Maybe we’ll want to give that a shot someday.”　In times past, with a president who hewed to democratic norms, the president’s wisecrack would have gone unnoticed.　 But with a president who has openly displayed such strong personal affinity for autocrats, the remark got wide play not ju

Posco, one of the Korean companies whose growth over the past decades is synonymous with what the world admires as the “Miracle on the Han River” celebrated its 50th anniversary on Monday. The anniversary provides some food for thought. Most of all, the steel company as we see it now shows how important having good and strong leadership is to build a nation and modernize its economy. As is well known, late President Park Chung-hee wanted to build a steel mill to spearhead the nation’s economic g