ANDREA PLATE WRITES — American women know well the indignity of being defined, and best-known, by the men they marry. But Huma Abedin, author of the utterly readable, just published memoir And/Both: A Life in Many Worlds (Scribner), is no ordinary woman; nor did she marry a nice ordinary man,…
Full Article AND/OR: A MEMOIR AB0UT SEX(T), LIES AND VIDEO POLITICS
SOPHIA JARAMILLO WRITES — As newly elected Vice President Kamala Harris will be endlessly discussed for her diplomatic relations and duties, her fashion will also be discussed, as it should be. It is necessary to bring light to the impact of all areas of her identity. Being of South Asian…
Full Article SOUTH ASIA: VICE-PRESIDENT ELECT KAMALA HARRIS CUTS A STRIKING FIGURE ON THE WORLD STAGE
WROTE LMU PROFESSOR MICHAEL GENOVESE WITHIN MINUTES AFTER THE 1ST CLINTON-TRUMP DEBATE – It was perhaps not a knockout, but certainly a TKO. Hillary was the clear winner in a lively and fascinating debate. On body language and facial expression, Trump looked like a spoiled child, smirking his way from…
Full Article U.S. ELECTION WATCH: WEST-WINGING IT?
EXCERPTED FROM ‘THE ORIENTAL ECONOMIST’ – Michael Green, the prominent and respected former George W. Bush foreign-policy adviser, on why he will vote for Hillary Clinton in November: “… During the primaries, I worked for Jeb Bush, and I briefed him on Asia. I was never going to vote for…
Full Article ASIA: HILLARY GETS THE GREEN LIGHT
TOM PLATE WRITES: A long time ago, it seems like a thousand years now, I worked in the State Department, however briefly, with the honor of a formal security clearance. In that role, as a backup speechwriter (I was quite young, but loved the experience, totally respected the careerists there),…
Full Article PACIFIC PERSPECTIVE COMMENTARY: THIS MEMO IS NOT CLASSIFIED!
TOM PLATE WRITES – These are times that try one’s pro-American soul. To succeed Barack Obama as president, the fight looks to have come down to a duel between know-nothing and a know-it-all – between a candidate who has never held any political office, and one who has held only…
Full Article CRAZY U.S. ELECTION: WHICH CANDIDATE MIGHT BE BEST FOR CHINA, JAPAN?TOM PLATE WRITES (IN THE SOUTH CHINA MORNING POST) – At times China and its ways are viewed from America as if little has changed. One of those times is now. This is our quadrennial U.S. presidential campaign season. Sometimes it is our silliest season. One spurious claim about China…
Full Article CHINA AND TRUMP: HOW HE USES IT
America’s 44th president is often cruelly hit, if sometimes quietly and behind his back, with the wicked “w” word. For many angry or disappointed people — here and abroad — that word is: “wimp.” It is hurled in the direction of the White House of Barack Hussein Obama as an…
Full Article A Sane Man Facing the InsanityThaksin Shinawatra (pictured left with his sister, Yingluck, the current Thai prime minister) is undoubtedly the most controversial politician ever to become prime minister of Thailand, an oft-ignored country in Southeast Asia with a population and landmass greater than Britain or Italy. (But who besides a Thai knows this?) Elected…
Full Article THAILAND’S CONTROVERSIAL THAKSIN VISITS LOS ANGELES — AND LMUA recent Bangladeshi magazine article posits that U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s recent visit to Bangladesh was not necessarily the sweet deal it might seem to be. Particularly if the two countries’ military and economic agreements prove lop-sided against Bangladesh’s interests. On the whole, the media went wild having…
Full Article BANGLADESH: Paper Skeptical of US Visit