Welcome! This is an unapologetic, agenda-free zone. Just commentaries on current events that’ll move you to think, laugh, rage, and even cry.
Kissinger, authoritarian whisperer of realpolitik Henry Kissinger was a titan of 20th-century geopolitics. But his legacy is as complex as it is controversial. Many hailed him as a master strategist. I railed against him as a cunning narcissist. He courted praise for dispensing sage chess-like geopolitical advice. Yet, I can fairly distill his diplomatic treatise… Read more.
Hong Kong police have made their first arrests under a new ‘anti-protest’ law imposed by Beijing, as crowds marked 23 years since the end of British rule. … The law, imposed by China following last year’s anti-government protests in the semi-autonomous territory, makes secessionist, subversive, or terrorist activities illegal, as well as foreign intervention in… Read more.
Sudan’s pro-democracy protesters celebrated the ouster of strongman Omar al-Bashir eight weeks ago. However, in doing so, they demonstrated the same naiveté as Egypt’s pro-democracy protesters when they celebrated the ouster of strongman Hosni Mubarak eight years ago. I published a commentary titled “Aping Egypt’s Ouster of Mubarak, Sudan Ousts Bashir” on April 17, 2019. In it, I admonished Sudan’s… Read more.
There was a brief time in recent history when tech companies seemed to be leading a renaissance in corporate social responsibility. Then came reports about sweatshop suicides, data breaches, and the peddling of user data. Those reports revealed that these companies are every bit as irresponsible as the ones that led the industrial revolution. But… Read more.
Egyptians go to the polls today for a presidential election that smacks of a coronation. After all, not only is voting compulsory, but President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi is effectively the only candidate. Frankly, the only uncertainty is whether he’s shameless enough to rig more than the 96.1 percent of the vote he rigged in 2014.… Read more.
Liu Xiaobo, the renegade Chinese intellectual who kept vigil at Tiananmen Square in 1989 to protect protesters from encroaching soldiers, promoted a pro-democracy charter that brought him a lengthy prison sentence and was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize while locked away, died under guard in a hospital on Thursday. He was 61. (New York Times,… Read more.
If reports of Gaddafi’s most egregious abuses turn out to be true, I suspect they will still pale in comparison to those Chinese leaders not only committed during their brutal crackdown on pro-democracy protesters in Tiananmen Square in 1989, but are committing today in their continual vigilance to attack any sign of democratic expression as if it… Read more.
