Efforts have been made at nuclear power plants across the nation to ramp up safety measures in the wake of the series of serious accidents that occurred at Tokyo Electric Power Co.’s Fukushima No. 1 nuclear plant in the aftermath of the massive tsunami on March 11.Plant operators reportedly aim to establish safety measures to prevent similar accidents from happening even if a plant is struck by a

The fast fall in vegetable prices must be what Chinese policymakers have long anticipated in their fight against soaring consumer inflation. But sadly, as the recent suicide of a cabbage grower Han Jin in Shandong province shows, it is proving too dear for many Chinese farmers. The Ministry of Commerce and the Ministry of Agriculture are right to take immediate action to help farmers facing an ove

WASHINGTON ― It’s a truth of economics and life that if you have bad news coming, take the hit early and get it behind you. You can’t start building until the debris is out of the way. Modern illustrations of this “pain, then gain” approach start with Paul Volcker, Mr. Tough Guy, who as Fed chairman sharply raised interest rates in 1979 to break the inflationary psychology that had a grip on the U

The line between prudence and moral cowardice can be a fine one, particularly when it comes to the conduct of diplomacy.For Americans, the question of where and how to make such distinctions has a particular urgency last week, as we commemorated the 96th anniversary of the genocide inflicted on the Armenians by the Ottoman Turks. In massacres from 1915 to 1923, more than 1.5 million Armenians were

How happy are you? How happy is the country? This very important question has gradually gained attention over the years, occupying the attention not only of psychologists and New Age gurus, but of economists, political scientists and government leaders.The field of happiness studies is booming with researchers hard at work taking our emotional temperature, figuring out how we feel and trying to un

I have a blue-ribbon commission in mind for Ray LaHood as he tries to sort out what to do about sleeping air traffic controllers. The panel members I’m thinking of have names like Preston & Steve, Cataldi, heck, maybe even Harvey in the Morning. Because when I heard the secretary of transportation say he’d never allow naps on the job, the first person I thought of was a radio DJ.For years, Don Can

In Korea you can easily find nice and warm-hearted people who are generous and trustworthy. In today’s Korean society, however, you may also come across three types of people: the silly, the sly, and the ugly. As for me, I have always been hopelessly silly. When I was awarded a Fulbright scholarship for my graduate study in the United States in 1978, South Korea was not as affluent as it is today.

From April into midsummer last year, Americans watched BP’s oil spew from the seafloor into the Gulf of Mexico with outrage and guilt that came to feel like a chronic stomachache.Then, on July 15, it stopped. And within a couple of weeks the bad feelings for a lot of us stopped too. There were reports that the surface oil was quickly disappearing. There was a government study that hopeful journali

A week after Apple Inc. filed a patent lawsuit with a California court against Samsung Electronics, the latter came up with countersuits against Apple at courts in Korea, Japan and Germany. While the battle between the two global giants will cost both sides huge legal, the suits could generate enough consumer interests in the products of both parties to more than compensate the costs of litigation

Singer and actor Rain was chosen as the most influential person in the world in a Time magazine poll for the third time since 2006. Rain, 28, with the Korean name Jung Ji-hoon, took the top spot in the Time 100 reader poll for the third year, trouncing competitors from Barack Obama to Lady Gaga, the U.S. news magazine said. Calling him “the unstoppable South Korean superstar,” Time reviewed how Ra

Laurent Gbagbo, who was captured after a long and brutal civil war in Ivory Coast, said a year before he became president in 1999: “What does (former Serbian and Yugoslavian President Slobodan) Milosevic think he can do with the whole world against him? When everyone in the village sees a white loincloth, if you are the only person to see it as black, then you are the one who has a problem.”What m

Father: Can the people of my country tell me how I am to rule?Son: Do you not see that you are speaking like a child?Father: Should I rule this land for others and not (for) myself?Son: There is no state that belongs to a single man.Father: Does the state not belong to its ruler?Son: Alone in a desert, you would make a perfect ruler.The above dialogue between King Creon and his son, Haemon, took p

He was a frustrating patient, a retired field worker with poorly controlled diabetes and hypertension. I’d warned, I’d pleaded, I’d explained, but nothing had worked. He ignored dietary advice, didn’t exercise and failed to use his medication rigorously. We grew to dread his visits. Then one day he came to the office early for medication refills. His pot belly was almost gone, and his blood sugar

I get lots of emails. They generally break down like this: People telling me I’m brilliant and the reason print media is hanging on; people telling me I’m a moron and the reason print media is dying; people trying to get me to write about their book/cause/personal gripe; people asking me to read something they wrote about their book/cause/personal gripe; and people asking for help with their homew

If a company is to prosper, one of the first things it must do is hire people with skills, knowledge, capacity and other qualifications that can be put to good use. It goes without saying that no restrictions should be placed on the process of selecting qualified persons from among job applicants.But Hyundai Motor Co.’s unionized workers demand their children be given favors when they apply for em

Cronyism in the legal profession is set to be weakened, if not removed, with the National Assembly scheduled to act on a bill to restrict the practice of law by judge- and prosecutor-turned lawyers this month. Given a bipartisan accord, its passage is almost assured.If the bill is approved, lawyers will be banned for one year from serving as counsel on cases tried or investigated by the court or t

The desire to “do something” about the situation in Libya drove the U.N. Security Council to authorize use of all possible measures ― diplomatic language for military force ― to protect civilian populations in that troubled country. The consensus behind that vote quickly evaporated as Russia and China, holders of permanent seats and vetoes on the Security Council and which abstained on the decisio

With no end in sight the situation is turning into a humanitarian disaster with far-reaching consequences After weeks of seesawing firefights, the Libyan conflict seems to have fallen into a stalemate. The Western allies have assumed that they could intervene and oust Libyan ruler Muammar Gadhafi through air strikes. But even with the aid of the allied bombardment the rebel forces have been unable

Concern over the degradation of the ecological system in and around the Mekong River ― which flows through China, Laos, Thailand, Cambodia and Vietnam ― has grabbed the attention of a leading lawmaker in the United States. Senator Jim Webb, chairman of the powerful Senate Committee on Foreign Relations and its Subcommittee on East Asian and Pacific Affairs, issued a statement recently saying he wa

The South China Sea has long been a contention among many littoral states. China, Brunei, Malaysia, the Philippines, Taiwan and Viet Nam claim all or part of the Spratlys, which are believed to sit on vast mineral resources.Indonesia has no such claim. However, part of its Exclusive Economic Zone on the Natuna Islands protrudes into this vast ocean. More importantly, any instability in the area wi