In The News

BBC News: What Lies Ahead for Divided Venezuela?

Will Grant July 31, 2017
Venezuela is in crisis even though it has the largest proved oil reserves in the world. The country depends heavily on oil revenues and mismanaged the industry. President Nicolás Maduro, in office since 2013, lacks control and credibility. Election results of assembly members charged with changing the constitution are suspect: The government claims that more than 40 percent of the electorate...

Financial Times: America’s Looming Constitutional Crisis

Edward Luce July 28, 2017
Investigations into interference in the 2016 US presidential election continue, with reports suggesting that the special counsel is examining the Trump Organization’s financial dealings with Russia. Leaders around the globe follow every detail to assess the resilience of US law. Donald Trump has called the investigations a witch hunt, expressing anger after the attorney general, an early...

Challenge to US Power – Chinese Exceptionalism: WSJ

Te-Ping Chen and Josh Chin July 27, 2017
China’s rise has been steady and fast since the country embraced trade and globalization in the 1980s. If the trajectory continues, China will soon surpass the United States in GDP and other areas. Chinese people have taken notice and take increasing pride in their country’s growth and strength, report Te-Ping Chen and Josh Chin for the Wall Street Journal. Surveys suggest that 80 percent of...

Politico: Trump Administration to Allow for 15,000 More Foreign Workers

Louis Nelson July 21, 2017
The US departments of Homeland Security and Labor have announced that they will issue up to 15,000 additional H-2B visas for temporary, non-agricultural workers this year. Secretary of Homeland Security John Kelly explained the decision to increase the Congressionally-approved cap of 66,000 H-2B visas per year as a supply-and-demand problem: “there are not enough qualified and willing US workers...

CNBC: Technology and Globalization Are Eliminating the Middle Class

Berkeley Lovelace Jr. July 14, 2017
Advances in technology continue to reduce the need for many low-skilled positions in the United States, reported Federal Chair Janet Yellen to the House Financial Services Committee. She also targeted a limited form of globalization – outsourcing workplaces and jobs to other countries – for reinforcing the effects of automation along with retailers reducing jobs in response to greater demands by...

Science: Cocaine Trafficking Is Destroying Central America’s Forests

Emiliano Rodríguez Mega July 12, 2017
Researchers at US universities are positing that that cocaine trafficking accounted for more than 900,000 acres of deforestation in Honduras, Guatemala and Nicaragua from 2001 to 2013. The drug trade directs 90 percent of cocaine in the United States through Central America, and “traffickers in the region had to figure out a way to funnel their money into the legal economy,” notes Emiliano...

Forbes: Without "Neutral" Internet, US Workers Could Lose

Janet Burns July 12, 2017
If the US Federal Communications Commission drops protections on net neutrality, the country's innovation and global competitiveness will decline. Companies and internet users are speaking out to block a proposal by FCC Chairman Ajit Pai to roll back the protections: “these so-called "net neutrality rules" establish that internet service providers (ISPs) must comply with Title II...