John J. Metzler UNITED NATIONS — It’s long been an economic truism that the United States pays the lions share of the UN budget. Moreover the European Union (EU) countries contribute the largest bloc of dues of the 193 member organization. Well, there’s good and bad news. The USA’s budget assessment is no longer as […]
Special to WorldTribune.com By Donald Kirk, East-Asia-Intel.com When Kim Jong-Un and the North Korean propaganda machine hint they’ve got startling new weapons for striking terror into Americans thousands of miles away, they may not be talking about just their long-range missiles. How about drones, possibly the most talked about new death-dealer in the inventory of […]
Special to WorldTribune.com By Larry Ward and Carter Clews Karl Rove has declared war on the conservative wing of the GOP, and the Republican Party now risks being reduced to rubble. This is yet another in a series of internecine conflagrations that a certain segment of the party insists on reigniting every decade, or so, […]
Sol W. Sanders MUMBAI (BOMBAY), India — Is the Indian economy retreating back into “the Hindu rate of growth” which characterized the stagnation of four decades when New Delhi ran the economy with its imitation of Soviet planning? A returning former resident finds more than a touch of Calcutta’s notorious chaos and poverty in […]
Special to WorldTribune.com By Willy Lam, East-Asia-Intel.com New Chinese leader Xi Jinping has flatly ruled out political reform in an unpublished internal speech during his recent tour of the quasi-capitalist Guangdong Province. According to a transcript of the speech obtained by East-Asia-Intel.com, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) General Secretary bitterly accused party members who favored […]
Sol W. Sanders JERUSALEM — One of the most quoted of Maynard Milord many clever aphorisms is: “You can’t push on a string”. Keynes was referring to extending credit to an unreceptive investment market. [Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke are you listening?] The quip comes to mind this morning on the eve of President Barack […]
Special to WorldTribune.com By Donald Kirk, East-Asia-Intel.com The fields of North Hwanghae Province in southwestern North Korea looked lush and green when I was there in July. One of the North Korean minders helpfully explained why the farmers there had it pretty good. They divided their crops between the state and themselves. The more they […]
Special to WorldTribune.com WASHINGTON — President Barack Obama’s nominee to head the CIA is said to have secretly converted to Islam in Saudi Arabia. A former FBI agent reported that CIA nominee John Brennan secretly converted to Islam between 1996 and 1999 when he served as CIA station chief in the Saudi capital of Riyad. […]
Special to WorldTribune.com By Lee Jong-Heon, East-Asia-Intel.com SEOUL — North Korea’s high-profile nuclear threats despite international warnings of consequences that could jeopardize the country’s economic future signals instability in Kim Jong-Un’s regime that could trigger internal backlash, an analyst here said. The destitute nation, during its final stage of preparations for a third nuclear test, […]
Wesley Pruden Barack Obama says he’s not a Muslim, but a Christian. That’s his business, between the president and God. The president clearly has a soft spot in his heart for Islam. He once described the call to evening prayer, which he first heard as a child in a Muslim school in Indonesia, as “one […]
