Friday , 19 December 2025

Opinion

Airports of the future are here

No matter how well-regarded a particular airport happens to be, the slog from curb to cabin is pretty much the same wherever you go. A decades-old paradigm of queues, security screens, snack vendors, and gate-waiting prevails—the only difference is the level of stress. The sky portal of the 2040s, however, is likely to be free of such delights. Many of …

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Washington state cracks down on gunshop lies

Washington began taking the threat of gun violence more seriously. The gun dealers in the state will be required to notify law enforcement when someone who is not legally allowed to buy a firearm tries to do so. There were more than 3,000 such people in Washington in 2015. They went to a licensed gun dealer and filled out a …

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How to make lawsuits work for consumers

Congressional Republicans and the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau are clashing over a question that has implications far beyond the world of finance: How far can companies go to protect themselves from customer lawsuits? Neither side has got the answer quite right. If you’ve ever signed up for a credit card, you’ve most likely skipped through the boilerplate contracts at the …

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Brexit disarray points only towards disaster

The Brexit talks have started, and there’s little sign yet of an intelligible UK strategy. All is disarray. The shambles makes two bad possible outcomes more likely. One is that the UK will crash out of the European Union in 2019 with no agreement in place. This would cause enormous economic disruption — damage that would take years to repair. …

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Greece shouldn’t be greedy in its second rehab attempt

Greece has decided to brave the waters with a new five-year benchmark bond, the first fresh deal for nearly three years. Fortune favors the brave — but not the greedy. For now, a successful return to the fixed income markets matters more than securing the very best terms or the most money. Greek bonds have been the stand-out performer in …

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1997 legacy makes Indonesia’s balancing act harder

Never again. That’s the mantra of Indonesia’s class of 1998 — the officials who were young adults when the country plunged into the Asian financial crisis that began two decades ago this month. The question now is whether their understandable caution could hold back Southeast Asia’s biggest — and at times, most frustrating — economy. Most retrospectives of the crisis …

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The wild blue yonder ain’t what it used to be

The aircraft arrayed around the spacious lawn of Maxwell Air Force Base, home of the Air University, mostly represent long-retired types. The largest, however, is a glistening B-52 bomber, which represents a still-employed component of the Air Force’s aging fleet: The youngest B-52 entered service in 1962. Sons have flown the same plane their fathers and grandfathers flew. But, then, …

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Why RIL bonus issue syncs with its effectively free JioPhone!

Reliance Industries Ltd’s (RIL’s) unexpected 1-for-1 bonus issue, which chairman Mukesh Ambani unveiled at the company’s 40th annual general meeting (AGM) on Friday, gave a further boost to shares that are already the second-best performing this year on India’s benchmark index. What’s interesting about the announcement, however, is the timing. The last time India’s most-valuable company gave one free share …

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Two wrongs don’t make a right on ‘hearings’

Why is Chuck Schumer doing Donald Trump a favor? The Senate minority leader’s delaying tactics for the president’s nominees are not only uncalled for, but they also distract from the White House’s historic ineptitude at filling the senior ranks of government. So far, the Trump administration has made 163 fewer nominations than former President Barack Obama at the same point, …

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How to win online war against IS

On the ground in Iraq and Syria, IS is on the brink of military defeat. Online, however, the group continues to incite its followers to violence, and victory there will take the same kind of sustained effort that anti-terrorist forces brought to the battlefield. The foremost challenge is to identify individuals susceptible to the terrorists’ messages and intervene before they’re …

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