Tis the season to be selfish. Right after the global financial crisis exploded in 2008, many economists fretted that countries looking to hold on to their share of a shrinking pie would become more self-interested and protectionist, plunging the planet into an even sharper downturn, just as happened in the 1930s after the Great Depression. Thanks to panic-fueled crisis management by policymakers, it didn't happen. But after three years of pain and very little economic gain, it may be happening ...

Punjab Province in India was curry-hot with religious conflicts and revolts against British rule until 1937, when moderate Sir Sikander Hyat Khan, member of a distinguished Moslem family, became Premier of the Punjab. By straightforward administration and sense-making pleas for Hindu-Moslem unity, he succeeded in uniting the major political parties of the Punjab's 28 millions—56% Moslems, 27% Hindu, 13% warrior Sikhs—into a coalition Government which brought internal peace to the Province and has raised 500,-ooo troops to fight the Axis. ...

There are few men in the world who haven't muttered a quiet word of thanks to the anonymous man who invented the name tag, that "Hello, my name is" accessory that can be such a lifesaver at cocktail parties. It's not certain, of course, that a man invented it, but the odds are good, since so many males — far more than females — would be helpless without it. It's long been an accepted truth among married couples ...

Word leaked out almost as soon as the giant U.S. Air Force C-5A transport plane touched down in the Bolivian city of Santa Cruz. As U.S. embassy spokesmen in the capital city of La Paz and Defense Department officials in Washington tried to downplay the matter, headlines in Bolivia and the U.S. were blaring the news: in the first use of a U.S. military operation on foreign soil to fight drugs, Army Black Hawk helicopters, armed with .30-cal. machine guns ...

Political TV docudramas, not unlike the Bay of Pigs invasion, are proxy wars. The battles over them tend to be less about their lasting effect on history and more about a camp's power to protect its icons. Conservatives agitated CBS into pulling The Reagans in 2003, saying it cast the Gipper as a bigot and a nitwit . Before ABC's The Path to 9/11 aired in 2006, former Clinton aides blasted it as unfair to their Administration. If people remember ...

AN exclusive formal ball will mark Halloween in San Francisco this week. In couturier gowns and elaborately confected masquerades, the couples will whisk around the floor until 2 a.m., while judges award prizes for the best costumes and the participants elect an "Empress." By then the swirling belles will sound more and more deep-voiced, and in the early morning hours dark stubble will sprout irrepressibly through their Pan-Cake Make-Up. The celebrators are all homosexuals, and each year since 1962 the ...

America's ruminations about women and work are so politically loaded these days -- there are breakthroughs and backlashes, mommy tracks and mommy wars, glass ceilings and pink-collar ghettos -- that it is often hard to get at the truth. Consider the mixed message from Women and the Work/Family Dilemma by Deborah Swiss and Judith Walker, a much touted book to be published this month. Based on a survey of 902 female graduates of Harvard's law, medical and business schools, the ...

The far-right British National Party on Thursday agreed to consider letting nonwhite members join after the country's Equality and Human Rights Commission took them to court. The move would require a change to the party's constitution, which it will put to its members for a vote next month, a spokesman for the party told CNN. The members could, in theory, reject the change, spokesman John Walker said, noting "there is a range of opinions across the membership." But, he added, ...

In a passionate address to Northern Ireland's legislature, U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton on Monday pledged Washington's commitment to the Northern Ireland peace process. There still are those who want to undermine that process, she warned, trying to derail it with "thuggish tactics." In the Stormont Assembly were members of at least six political parties -- men and women, she said, "who once were sworn enemies who now work side by side." "Please know that the Obama ...

After decades of coddling military dictators in Pakistan, Washington wants a different relationship with its key partner in the war against al-Qaeda. The Kerry-Lugar Act which has passed the Senate, after a similar bill passed in the House last month, would provide $7.5 billion in nonmilitary aid over the next five years, in an ambitious plan to counter widespread anti-American sentiment there by helping Pakistan's civilian government deliver essential services to its population. Unlike previous no-strings aid packages, Kerry-Lugar ...