Do you remember the winter of debt? In late 2010 and early 2011, the U.S. economy had barely begun to recover from the 2008 financial crisis. Around 9 percent of the labor force was still unemployed; long-term unemployment was especially severe, with more than 6 million Americans having been out of work for 6 months […]

On New Year’s Day, part of Belgium put into effect a ban on the way Muslims and Jews slaughter animals. The law declares that the animals must be stunned insensible before they are killed, a practice widely applied in the global food industry but rejected by some observant Muslims and Jews, who insist that their […]

China’s northern city of Harbin kicked off its annual ice and snow festival on Jan. 5 with fireworks that lit up the skies over the icy wonderland. When night came, coloured lights illuminated towering sculptures of ice and snow carved by thousands of artists and workers. The 35th Harbin International Ice and Snow Sculpture Festival […]

To the Editor: Re “American Jews and Israeli Jews Break Up,” by Jonathan Weisman (news analysis, Sunday Review, Jan. 6): We would do well to consider the theology of the Zionist Martin Buber. In the relationship Buber calls “I-thou,” parties remain concerned with each other’s fears and hopes while maintaining the right to advance their […]

This article is part of the David Leonhardt newsletter. You can sign up here to receive the newsletter each weekday. I’ll confess to being torn about the major television networks’ decision to air President Trump’s speech tonight on the border wall. On the one hand, the networks said no to President Barack Obama when he […]

(Reuters) – Swiss chemicals company Sika AG (SIKA.S) on Tuesday offered to buy smaller French rival Parex for an enterprise value of 2.5 billion Swiss francs ($2.55 billion) from a fund owned by CVC Capital Partners, and said its full-year sales beat its target. The acquisition is expected to generate annual synergies of 80-100 million […]

The customary tsk-tsks erupted when US President Donald Trump opined on the state of mind of Democrat Senator Elizabeth Warren during a interview on Fox News. Asked if Warren thinks she can beat him in 2020, Trump replied, “You’d have to ask her psychiatrist.” Trump’s critics are so reflexively critical at this point that they […]

It’s happened to all of us at one time or another – you witness a friend, colleague or loved one making a demonstrably bad decision, yet every time you try to rationalise with them, they stick their fingers in their ears and start humming to themselves until you walk away in exasperation. Eventually, you have […]

I have nothing to do and all day, and every day, to do it. Which isn’t good. There’s a range of reasons for this. Mostly because college, where I am a third-year mature, is still out until the last week of the month. That’s on top of a Christmas that seemed, as it always does, […]

Edmonton Eskimos quarterback Zach Kline has two major passions; of course one is football, the other is music. He first picked up a guitar when he was eight years old and fell in love with playing and writing songs. He only took lessons for a few months, finding that playing in bands taught him more. […]