CAMBRIDGE -- This year’s presidential election campaign in the United States is certainly unique. Donald Trump has shaken up the way a campaign is run, how a nominee communicates with voters, and the Republican Party’s platform, with many of his positions deviating from GOP tradition. But, on tax policy, Trump has toed the party line -- and that’s not a good thing.Of course, any assessment of Trump’s declared positions risks being rendered meaningless within a few hours. He changes his positions

Of all living things, why do humans alone create advanced technology? Not long ago, scientists thought it was because we are the only intelligent life form on this planet. That explanation alone no longer suffices. Over the last decade, scientists have discovered that crows can use tools, hyenas can cooperate to solve complex problems, jays can plan for the future, rats and voles can demonstrate empathy and ducklings are capable of abstract thought.Yet our technology is extraordinary. Why were w

With the Summer Olympics closing ceremony around the corner, are Brazilians raising their national cocktail caipirinhas or crying in them? There is reason for Rio to revel -- the Zika scare has not turned into a Zika crisis. The polluted waters of Guanabara Bay, Rodrigo de Freitas Lagoon and along Fort Copacabana have not induced outbreaks of retching among swimmers, rowers and sailors. Rafaela Silva, a young female judo athlete from Rio’s infamous City of God favela, gave Brazil its first gold

President Park Geun-hye will visit Russia and China next month, amid backlash from the two countries over South Korea and the US’ decision to station the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense system on the peninsula.After her visit to Vladivostok for the Eastern Economic Forum from Sept. 2-3, Park is scheduled to participate in the G-20 summit, slated for Sept. 4-5 in Hangzhou.A summit between South Korea and Russia has been arranged and it remains to be seen whether Park will be able to hold bila

About 4 in every 10 units of the nation’s top 10 conglomerates saw their sales fall during the first half of the year.Data from the Korea Exchange showed that 26 of 68 listed firms, or 38.2 percent, of the 10 business groups suffered a drop in sales on-year.On a consolidated basis, five of the 10 groups reported decreases in revenue. SK topped the list with 6.8 trillion won ($6.1 billion), followed by POSCO with 6.6 trillion won, Hyundai Heavy Industries with 4.1 trillion won, LG with 1.4 trilli

Be afraid! Even after weeks of missteps, polls suggest that more than a third of American voters still support Donald Trump. If Trump wins, expect to find him decorating the Oval Office with Hillary Clinton’s taxidermied head -- and expect to find me breaking rocks in a Trumpian labor and re-education camp along with all the rest of America’s journalists, its intellectuals, non-Christians, immigrants and people of color.But though the Trumpocalypse remains a worrying possibility, there may yet b

Nowadays, if you’re a smart college graduate, Silicon Valley and its tech-startup scene is the hot place to be. But 10 years ago, it seemed like everyone with a brain and big ambitions wanted to go to Wall Street. The worlds of investment banking and trading were a golden ladder to the good life.Why did so many smart kids go into finance -- and why do so many still do so? One fairly obvious reason is that finance pays a lot of money. Maybe that‘s both cause and effect -- talent could be drawn to

The Korean business community is abuzz with talk of corporate restructuring, as a special law took effect last week to help companies suffering from an oversupply in their industrial sectors reorganize their businesses.The Special Act on Corporate Revitalization, commonly called the “one-shot act,” is designed to encourage companies to make voluntary and pre-emptive restructuring efforts before their businesses go from bad to worse.It provides a wide range of benefits to companies whose restruct

North Korea’s deputy ambassador in London has defected to South Korea with his family, suggesting the growing instability of the North’s regime under a ruthless and reckless young leader.The Unification Ministry on Wednesday confirmed domestic and British media reports that Thae Yong-ho, a minister at the North’s embassy in London, has defected. The ministry said Thae and his family arrived in Seoul, denying media reports that they were seeking asylum in a third country. Thae is one of the highe

Playing with numbers will never end the Thai crisis. While most critics of the draft charter, which sailed through the referendum on Aug. 7, are accepting the outcome gracefully, a few have zeroed in on the relatively low voter turnout. Red Shirt leader Jatuporn Prompan suggested that heads must roll among election commissioners because the turnout of just over 50 percent was a far cry from the pre-referendum “boasting” that targeted 80 percent.The undertone of the criticism from the never-say-d

The devastating impact of forest and peatland fires on humans last year went beyond our tolerance. Dozens were killed, more than 500,000 others suffered from respiratory infections and 43 million people across Indonesia and neighboring states had to brave smog, according to the National Disaster Mitigation Agency (BNPB).With the fires recurring in Riau and Aceh, two of the regular hotspots in the country, last week, it is very much understandable that President Joko “Jokowi” Widodo immediately c

This is the seventh article in a series of columns on global affairs written by top editors from members of the Asia News Network and published in newspapers across the region. 　A few days ago, I sat down with Mr. Dwight Hutchins, chairman of the American Chamber of Commerce (AmCham) in Singapore, to discuss the chamber’s 2017 ASEAN Business Outlook Survey.Published in collaboration with the US Chamber of Commerce and conducted on behalf of companies from a nation that is the largest investor in

The fight against the Islamic State group may get the headlines. But it is the military threats from Russia and China that most worry top Pentagon officials -- and are driving a new arms race to deter these great-power rivals. This question of how to deal with Russian and Chinese military advances has gotten almost no attention in the 2016 presidential campaign. But it deserves a careful look. The programs that begun in the waning days of the Obama administration could potentially change the fac

If only those First Amendment people could do something about Donald Trump. His latest attack on their sacred cow is the assertion that “It is not ‘freedom of the press’ when newspapers and others are allowed to say and write whatever they want even if it is completely false!”That’s wrong as a matter of constitutional law. But it’s not crazy. In fact, the US Supreme Court has recently accorded a high degree of protection to falsehoods. And the kinds of justices that the Republican presidential n

There is no doubt that the judiciary should have the highest ethical standards. The corruption scandal involving the founder of the Nature Republic cosmetics firm shows that it is not the case in Korea. Prosecutors are investigating a senior judge who allegedly kept suspicious ties with Jung Woon-ho, the central figure in the scandal that has already sent a former senior prosecutor and a former senior judge into custody. Prosecutors said the senior judge, with the help of a plastic surgeon who a

Two recent events gave clues as to what is on President Park Geun-hye’s mind. The first one is her latest Cabinet appointments and the second one is her Liberation Day address. On Tuesday, Park replaced three Cabinet ministers and four vice minister-level officials, which, as opposition parties pointed out, fell far short of public expectations. It is true that unlike most of her predecessors, Park refrained from using appointments of senior officials for political purposes -- like defusing a cr

China watchers in the West have been fruitlessly searching for signs of democracy for more than 25 years. But there has not been a sustained democracy movement in China since the tragic end of protests in Tiananmen Square and elsewhere in 1989. Most outside observers agree that the People’s Republic remains what it has been since its founding in 1949: a one-party authoritarian regime.Most Chinese citizens do not see it that way, however. In a nationwide survey in 2014, more than 4,000 urban Chin

In the early hours of D-Day 1944, the Allies landed 156,000 troops on the beaches of France, spelling doom for the Third Reich. In Berlin, 1,000 kilometers away, night-owl Adolf Hitler slept peacefully through the largest invasion in history. No aide dared awaken the boss with such bad news.Being a messenger can indeed be unpopular, even dangerous. Ask any member of the modern-day political media covering a most bizarre presidential race. Neither side, nor much of the audience, likes or helps th

Our Olympic athletes are doing well in Rio de Janeiro toward their “10-10” goal of at least 10 gold medals and a top 10 finish in the overall medal standings. It is a modest goal considering the past records since the 1988 Summer Olympics in Seoul, when South Korea ranked fourth. For one of the “middle powers” of the world with a population of 50 million on a land of less than 100,000 square kilometers, Korea certainly has an impressive Olympic medals log, which ranked it 5th in London four year

Democrats are bracing for another wave of embarrassing disclosures unleashed by what the US intelligence community asserts is a Russian-engineered hacking attack. Guccifer 2.0, the hacker (hackers?) believed to be tied to Russian intelligence, posted on Aug. 12 internal Democratic Party documents with email addresses and cellphone numbers for nearly 200 lawmakers. Guccifer also talked of plans to turn over to WikiLeaks another trove of sensitive material hacked from Democratic Party computers. “