LONDON — Drip, drip, drip: The neverending stream of revelations has been compared by one British member of Parliament to “torture” — waterboarding? — and rightly so. One day, it emerges that a senior MP has charged British taxpayers £2,000 (about $3,200 as of yesterday) for the cleaning of the moat on his 13th-century estate. A few days later, another MP is revealed to have charged 1,645 pounds for a floating duck house. Read on »

Apparently, President Obama told some good jokes at a dinner. The British Parliament is mired in an expenses scandal (one politician charged the government more than $3,000 to repair a leaking pipe under his tennis court). In China, they’re marking the anniversary of the earthquake that left some 80,000 people dead or missing a year ago, and in France, a young tennis star has tested positive for cocaine. But swine flu? The world’s media have moved on. Read on »

WARSAW — After the new Starbucks opened, I walked by the place a couple of times, just to see the crowds. Strategically located midway between the university and the stock exchange, the world’s best-known coffee franchise immediately attracted a well-heeled clientele. Lines twisted around inside the shop and out the door. Up and down the street, blue-jeaned students and dark-suited stockbrokers carried their white paper cups with pride, the famous green label facing outward. Read on »

Yesterday, the front page of my morning newspaper featured a photograph of uniformed Mexican police officers, machine guns at the ready, surgical masks strapped to their faces, seemingly prepared to defend their compatriots against the sudden outbreak of swine flu. I live in Warsaw, which is pretty far from Mexico City. But even if I lived in Paris, my morning paper would have contained similar pictures; so would it have done if I lived in Sydney or Kuala Lumpur. Read on »

We’ve been waiting a long time for political upheaval to follow in the wake of technological change, and on April 7, it seemed to have arrived. From Moldova, of all places, came news of the Twitter Revolution: Read on »

CHARLOTTESVILLE — Odd though it sounds, there is deep satisfaction to be had in watching one’s child clutch the pen of Thomas Jefferson’s “polygraph machine,” steady it with his grubby hands and carefully draw two identically wobbly circles. Read on »

It is no fun to be the one who rains on the parade, and, if nothing else, President Obama’s trip to Europe has been quite a parade. Or maybe “sold-out concert tour” is the better metaphor. Read on »

And now for a riddle: What is big, loud, unnecessary, and costs $75 million? No, not a retired elephant in a diamond-studded dress: The answer is, of course, a Group of 20 summit. Read on »

Press the reset button. Is there any phrase more enticing in the modern lexicon? We all know what it means: Press the reset button, watch your computer reboot, and presto! A nice, clean screen appears, and you start again from scratch. Read on »

“America is a shining city upon a hill whose beacon light guides freedom-loving people everywhere.”              

 –Ronald Reagan, 1974, echoing John Winthrop, 1630

From the earliest days of our republic, Americans have been drawn to the idea of their nation as different, exceptional, an example for others. Sometimes that view has been shared by outsiders, who really did strive to be guided by our “beacon light,” and sometimes not. Never mind: Read on »