In The News

Global Warming May Be Spurring Allergy, Asthma

Gautam Naik May 10, 2007
Increasing carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, a result of global warming, is boosting pollen rates and exacerbating allergy and asthma symptoms. A study from a US Department of Agriculture researcher has demonstrated that ragweed plants grown in urban settings, typically warmer and containing more exhaust fumes, have five times the pollen of rural plants, reports Gautam Naik for “The Wall Street...

Army Squeezes Soldier Blogs, Maybe to Death

Noah Shachtman May 9, 2007
Since the invasion of Iraq, the US is managing the first war in which cell phones, laptops, e-mail connections and digital cameras are plentiful, allowing troops to send instant messages and images. With the war in its fifth year, the US Army has ordered troops to clear all blog and e-mail content with supervisors before sending. Failure to obtain supervision can result in court marital or...

Save the WTO From the Doha Round

Ernesto Zedillo May 9, 2007
The World Trade Organization launched the Doha Round of negotiations to ease trade restrictions and reduce poverty. Attempts to revive the negotiations – stalled since summer of 2006 as the world’s wealthiest nations quarrel over how to end agricultural subsidies – continue to be stymied. The next development, predicts Ernesto Zedillo, director of the Yale Center for the Study of Globalization...

From China to Panama, A Trail of Poisoned Medicine

Walt Bogdanich May 8, 2007
In 1937, more than 100 people in the US died, after taking medicine that contained diethylene glycol, a solvent used in some anti-freeze products that looks and tastes like glycerin syrup, a common base for cough syrup and other medical products. The tragedy led to tough regulations and the start of the modern Food and Drug Administration. Decades later, counterfeiters in China tried the same...

Sources: New Law to Jolt Outsourcing

Shen Jianyuan May 4, 2007
China is drafting policy to bestow preferential tax treatment for its firms that focus on information-technology (IT) or business-process outsourcing. “Industry insiders regard this as an effort to overtake India in the outsourcing industry,” writes Shen Jianyuan for “The Economic Observer Online,” adding that the new policies will define and boost an industry now described as “disorganized.” The...

Unions for a Global Economy

Harold Meyerson May 3, 2007
Workers are following the footsteps of business executives, expanding and gaining global influence by merging with counterparts in other sectors and around the world. “As unions begin their inevitable transformation into global entities, globalization's cheerleaders must define themselves more clearly, urges “Washington Post” columnist Harold Meyerson. “In other words, are they really for...

EU-US Summit: Hands Across the Ocean

José Manuel Barroso April 27, 2007
Despite persistent fears in the West about emerging competition from developing economies, a more immediate concern for Americans and Europeans is their own trade relationship. While the people of the European Union and the US together make up barely 10 percent of the world's population, bilateral business between the two accounts for fully 40 percent of all international trade. That is why...