United States

South of the Border, the Cult of the Presidency

Washington Examiner Columnist, Vice President at the Cato Institute and author of “The Cult of the Presidency“ Gene Healy clearly despises rhetoric.
His article, recently published in the Examiner, opens by emphasizing the repetitiveness with which Obama deals with each administrative failure - by pushing the charm offensive. However, unlike Healy’s many counterparts at the Examiner, his is a [...]

Haitian Crisis Stirring Doubt in Governance – “The Government is Mute”

There are scant signs of help from the Haitian government during the ongoing crisis that has truly shook the world. The government appears scattered by the 7.0-magnitude earthquake Tuesday evening. The streets were filled with beleaguered residents milling about, left with no jobs, no instructions on what to do, and no place to buy food [...]

The Chavezjad Doctrine: Between Myth and Speculation

The Inter-American Dialogue has recently published the works of Michael Shifter, here specifically on the dangerous alliance between Iran and Venezuela, the mastermind behind the union, Hugo Chavez, a skilled provocateur indeed and its geopolitical ramifications hindering infrastructure, human rights and international development in every regard.
The following is excerpted from his article, “The Chavezjad Doctrine: Between [...]

Forging a New World Order

It is hard to envisage what role Venezuela’s president, Hugo Chávez, has in mind for the dozens of Russian tanks on his latest military shopping list. The strategic purpose of a recent tour that took him to some of the world’s least salubrious regimes is, however, easier to discern. And it has led America’s State [...]

Africa to Press for End to Zimbabwe Sanctions

African leaders will step up calls on today for an end to Western sanctions against Zimbabwe and will urge South Africa to plead Zimbabwe’s cause within the Group of 20 industrial and emerging nations, officials said.
The New York Times has reported tht countries of the Southern African Development Community will also press Zimbabwe’s president, Robert Mugabe, and its [...]

U.S.-China Relations: The Yin and Yang

American and Chinese officials said all the right things during this summer’s inaugural round of their Strategic and Economic Dialogue. President Barack Obama pledged to “forge a path to the future that we seek for our children.” Chinese State Councilor Dai Bingguo wondered aloud whether America and China can “build better relations despite very different [...]

Decreasing Political Risk Through ‘Good Coups’

“The only force that leaders truly fear is their own military. After all, a leader is far more likely to lose power as a result of a coup than in an election” - Paul Collier, Economics Professor at Oxford University
Paul Collier has written an insightful piece in the print edition of The Africa Report on coups [...]

Online Gambling in Europe

There is one area of online commerce where Europe sits on top of the world - the realm of online gambling.
Betfair, an online betting exchange based in London, has been called the eBay of sports betting, and indeed the vast majority of the websites that allow people to play poker and other games of chance [...]

After Obama Visit, Russia Resets to Default

By Robert Amsterdam, CFP Founder
Given where things stood going into Barack Obama’s first visit to Russia, it was moderately successful from a diplomatic perspective. The new U.S. president brought a few billion in business deals, agreed to some cuts in nuclear arms and made it clear he’d be willing to compromise on the contentious missile [...]

Obama’s Five Pillars of Foreign Policy

TIME Magazine’s Michael Scherer has comprised a list that in his eyes reflects U.S. President Barack Obama’s strategy towards foreign policy, which Scherer describes as a  ’hodgepodge of classic realpolitik, diplomatic determination, community-organizer idealism and charismatic leadership’. Although some question how a world tour is translated domestically (Ann Coulter seems to believe bad news is dished [...]