The following are editorial opinions from newspapers from around the world which may be of interest to Royal Gazette readers.

Boston Globe, on lessons from the movie 'Charlie Wilson's War'

Two messages are appended to the end of "Charlie Wilson's War," the artful Hollywood flick about a hedonistic Texas congressman who in the 1980s raised covert funding for the Afghan mujahadeen from $5 million to $1 billion, thereby helping to drive the Red Army out of Afghanistan and precipitate the implosion of the Soviet Union.

An explicit moral of the movie comes from the real-life Wilson, who lamented that America did the right thing in Afghanistan but messed up "the endgame". Today there can be little doubt that Washington's brusque loss of interest in the fate of Afghanistan after the Soviets' withdrawal was a calamitous. error.

But it is the second, more philosophical message that ought to be at the center of current debate about America's role in the world. This lesson, which the Bush administration has learned all too slowly, teaches the need for humility in those who make America's moves on a global chessboard — a virtue that seems almost totally absent from the patriotic posturing of the presidential candidates.

... Bush should have foreseen that the invasion and occupation of Iraq could become a strategic gift to Iran; that his pledge to foster democracy in the Muslim world while backing Pervez Musharraf in Pakistan would make America look hypocritical; or that his reluctance to seek a United Nations Security Council resolution to halt Israel's bombing of Lebanon in the summer of 2006 would inflame anti-American feelings in the Arab world. These are the sorts of unintended consequences a Zen master would expect — and a president must try to anticipate.

The Star-Ledger, Newark, N.J.,

on policing energy markets

Oil prices last week briefly shot above the once-unthinkable $100-a-barrel mark and are expected to do so again, heralding a spring when $4-a-gallon gasoline may become the new norm... But there's another remedy: Restore government authority to police energy trading markets, which has been shown to moderate wild petroleum price swings, even reduce prices.

Washington had this authority until a company named Enron seduced Congress and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission into eliminating it for most of the energy markets back in 2000. Enron claimed growing electronic markets could operate fine on their own. It hasn't worked out that way.

Unlike those who trade orange juice, silver or many other commodities, oil and gas traders can go their own way, secretly buying and selling the rights to huge amounts of energy products over unregulated electronic markets. The secret nature of these transactions creates a fertile field for fraud and price manipulation by oil firms, by traders, by hedge funds and investment houses. ...

Re-regulating wouldn't hinder legitimate investment in the energy markets, but it would help prevent illegal profiteering and save citizens money. With record-high oil prices, Americans and American businesses need all the help they can get.

The News-Press, Fort Myers, Florida,

on the execution 'cocktail' in Florida

Florida and other states that use drugs to execute capital criminals should stop dragging their feet and change the prescription.

It's pretty clear now that the three-drug cocktail developed as a humane alternative to the electric chair or gas chamber is itself unreliable. There's a better way, readily available, but someone needs to take the lead. It should be Florida, which has been studying the matter since the last botched lethal injection.

The US Supreme Court heard arguments ... on whether it violates the constitutional ban on cruel punishment to use methods that carry an unnecessary risk of pain and suffering, and if an alternative is available.

The simple sodium pentobarbital overdose used to put down pets is apparently more reliably painless than the complicated three-drug "cocktail" in general use in executions. ...

We need to apply the least painful, most effective method of execution, not because murderers deserve humane treatment but because we are not a nation of torturers. It's for our sake, not theirs. ...

The Los Angeles Times,

on experience and the US presidency

It is Hillary Rodham Clinton's misfortune to have spent a long and honourable career building up the experience that would qualify her to be a serious. candidate for president of the United States — only to come to the apex of that career just as the nation decided that experience isn't everything.

She squeaked out a victory on Tuesday, but across the wintry plains of Iowa and the unseasonably mild hills of New Hampshire, large numbers of voters in the past five days have affirmed that they are looking forward, not back, and thus swarming to Barack Obama's thoughtful, eloquent expression of hope and away from Clinton's call of experience and readiness. ...

Some of the same dynamics are at work among Republicans. Suddenly Mitt Romney, a second-generation politician, looks far less appealing than the flinty independence of John McCain. There, the politics of change are murkier, complicated by McCain's enduring popularity in New Hampshire, Mike Huckabee's popularity with Christian conservatives and Romney's inability to convince voters that he is a man of genuine conviction. Still, for Republicans as well as Democrats, it's a tough year to be a candidate whose principal credential is experience. ...

For Clinton, the trouble is not emotion but, perversely, President Bush. So badly has this president performed that he has discredited not just his own administration but the very idea of Washington knowledge.

Voters frustrated by the war in Iraq and anxious. about the economy have turned on the man who brought US those troubles and on experience itself — and thus on Clinton. She still has time, but now she must confront an electorate that has its doubts — and that has identified Obama with the future and Clinton with the past.

Chicago Tribune,

on change and the presidency

... (T) here is already an unequivocal victor in this campaign. It's not a person but a concept: change. ...

To some extent, "change" is an empty term whose value is that every voter can attach a preferred meaning to it. But only to some extent. This year, there may be more to the idea than meets the eye.

Both parties, after all, do represent change. The Democrats promise a break with President Bush on a host of major issues — Iraq, Guantánamo, taxes, No Child Left Behind and health care, to name a few. White House policy under any of them would be appreciably different from what it has been for the last seven years.

Republicans have their own disagreements with Bush — most conspicuously on immigration, where they pledge a tougher approach. On Iraq and the war on terrorism, it's true, they line up loyally behind Bush. But they also implicitly highlight what they see as his shortcomings. ...

But it's no accident that Obama has been able to make the idea so powerfully his own. He doesn't so much promise change as embody it. For the leader of the free world to be black would be a change of intangible but potentially profound import. ...

Presidents do usually alter the landscape, and with all the uncertainties ahead, the next one is not likely to be different in that respect. The important question is not whether these candidates will bring about change, but what kind.

The Morning Call, Allentown, Pa.,

on the US Freedom of Information

President Bush began the new year by signing a bill that will give the public and news media a bit more access to what the government is doing. The OPEN Government Act of 2007 represents the first time in a decade that the 40-year-old Freedom of Information Act has been updated and improved.

The legislation creates a way for the media and public to track the status. of FOIA requests. A hotline will be available for federal agencies and an ombudsman will handle disputes about disclosure as an alternative to litigation. Agencies will have 20 days to respond.

One disappointing feature of the bill signed by the President relates to the tone set by former Attorney General John Ashcroft a month after Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks. Mr. Ashcroft told government agencies to avoid releasing information if there was any uncertainty about whether it would affect national security. In other words, bureaucrats were told to presume secrecy. This is understandable in time or war or crisis, but a more moderate policy is a better fit with the government of, by and for the people. ...

There no doubt will be an even greater number of requests — and more information the media will share with the public — now that OPEN Government Act of 2007 has been signed.

The Washington Post,

on the New Hampshire primary results:

For all the hoopla over Barack Obama's post-Iowa bounce, in the end the Democratic voters of New Hampshire buoyed Hillary Rodham Clinton with a victory that confounded the pollsters. This is good news, and not just for the senator from New York. It's good news for the voters in all the states that haven't yet had a chance to express a preference. The situation is much the same on the other side: John McCain, whose campaign was written off as hopeless only weeks ago, won a decisive victory in the Republican primary that could keep the GOP race scrambled for some time to come. ...

As the New Hampshire results show, Mr. Obama has a formidable opponent in Ms. Clinton, who would bring to the presidency valuable experience, both in the White House and the Senate, that has given her a sophisticated understanding of the dangers and opportunities the United States faces in the world. Her policy positions overlap with Mr. Obama's more than they differ, but the differences aren't inconsequential, especially in foreign affairs, where Ms. Clinton has had the more sophisticated approach to how to deal with Iraq and other danger zones. The contrast between her experience and his inspiration opens a legitimate and important debate. It's good that more voters will have a chance to weigh in.

Augusta (Ga.) Chronicle,

on challenges in the Middle East:

... Whether it's through useless sanctions or the U.N. weapon of choice — the strongly worded memo — the United Nations is ill-equipped to deal with Iran's belligerent behaviour. If anything, Iran gets steadily worse. That fact gets proved every time the rogue Mideast country bares its fangs at the rest of the world.

This time it happened in the Strait of Hormuz, where five small Iranian boats Sunday harassed three US Navy ships and threatened to blow them up. The boats — believed to be part of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard's navy — dropped boxlike objects in the water in the ships' paths, then radioed the ships to threaten that the frigate, cruiser and destroyer would explode.

The boats came within less than 500 yards of the US formation, and the Navy was on the verge of opening fire when the boats backed off.

And opening fire is precisely what Iran wanted. What better international incident to give excuse for any deadly-force retaliation against the United States? ...

As diligently as America labours toward peace in the Middle East, at some point responsibility will have to fall upon the nations in that region to band together against Iran and rampant terrorism, in ways in which America isn't well-equipped. ...

The final answer for Mideast peace doesn't lie in the United States, or in wet-noodle U.N. sanctions. It lies among the people in the Middle East who want order and peace badly enough to fight for it themselves.

Gulf News, Dubai, UAE,

on the incident between the US and Iran

Strange this. On the eve of the first visit by the US president George W. Bush to Israel "an incident" has occurred between the US Navy and Iranian speedboats in the Strait of Hormuz. According to the US Navy, five small boats thought to be from the Revolutionary Guards passed in front of three US vessels, dropping boxes in the water to force them to take evasive action.

The fact that the boats are believed to be from the Revolutionary Guards is significant. The Revolutionary Guards were designated a terror organisation by Bush last year, allowing for military action to be taken against them without going for Congressional approval.

At the very least, the "incident" helps Bush set an agenda for his trip that puts the focus on Iran rather than on feeble US efforts to rein in Israel or push for what Bush himself has set a timetable for — a Palestinian state by the end of this year.

Relations between the US and Iran have been fraught in recent years, with Washington voicing concern over Iran's alleged nuclear program and the alleged role of the Revolutionary Guards in fomenting unrest in neighbouring Iraq. ...

The Strait of Hormuz is a flashpoint where a small event can suddenly become an international incident and the limited progress that has been made will be washed away in a tide of escalating rhetoric. Iran and the US must set up channels of communication and not leave their relationship hostage to "incidents."

Asahi Shimbun, Tokyo,

on the economic outlook for '08

The New Year brought a fresh round of turmoil to the world's markets for oil, stocks, currencies and gold. The market upheavals appear to portend a stormy year ahead. What is the outlook for the Japanese economy in 2008? One negative development that started last summer is the collapse of the US subprime mortgages.

The problem of surging defaults on these loans for low-income homebuyers has grown into a credit crisis in the United States and Europe, roiling financial and currency markets around the world. How severe a blow will the subprime meltdown deliver to the US economy? Will the crisis also hurt the economies of fast-growing countries like China and India by depressing their exports to the United States?

Uncertainty about the future of the economy is growing. The yen's upturn against the dollar is beginning to make a dent in the foreign exchange profits of exporters. ... What must be done to buoy the consumer side of the economy? ... Companies should also pay attention to the fortune of non-regular employees, such as temporary workers.

Management should try to improve their working conditions and make them permanent employees for long-term strength of the work force. In order to set the stage for renewed growth, Japanese companies now need to reform themselves by using more of the money they spend on factories for the development of human resources.

Austin (Texas) American-Statesman, on caring for veterans

President Bush has a new cabinet secretary for the Department of Veterans Affairs who appears to be eminently qualified for the job.

Secretary James Peake is a retired three-star general and a physician with more than three decades of experience in the Army's medical system. He is a former surgeon general of the Army and once led the US Army Medical Command at Fort Sam Houston in San Antonio.

Peake has promised to fix the problems causing so much heartache for America's veterans, particularly those returning from fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan.

He has plenty to do. Care for veterans has been generally dreadful since the war in Iraq began, from the disgrace of the Walter Reed Army Medical Center to the shocking number of veteran suicides. VA care varies by region and by hospital and clinic, but too many veterans aren't getting proper care. ...

Peake says he understands the gravity of the situation. He was wounded while serving as an infantry officer in Vietnam and has said he wrestled with post traumatic stress afterward.

Returning veterans must know they can get quick, effective help from Veterans Affairs when they are troubled. They shouldn't have to wait for two or three months for an evaluation. This is an issue Peake must address immediately.