In Egypt and Tunisia, the unions are at their most influential position in decades.

The following is a letter to the editor in response to an April 8 op-ed in The Financial Times on the possibility of countries opting to leave the eurozone.

Chris Christie has shown that confrontational leadership can get results and produce more admirers than detractors. Barack Obama has shown that lack of leadership leaves pretty much everyone dissatisfied.

An intriguing experiment is afoot in some of the nation’s struggling public schools. New “Parent Trigger” laws passed in California and on the agenda in New York, Ohio, Colorado, and Chicago, allow parents of chronically failing schools to unseat the schools’ leadership and staff. But the initiative has pitfalls.

To create private-sector jobs and raise wages for those now working, we must make America a magnet for investment from abroad. A trade agenda to promote exports is one piece of competing in a global economy, but without an aggressive campaign to draw in foreign investors’ resources, the United States will miss key employment and economic growth opportunities.

For domestic political reasons unrelated to trade, the US will be in no position to lead on international trade issues for some years. As the US is still the "indispensable nation" for WTO talks, this means 2011 is the last good opportunity for many years.

After Congress passes FTAs with Korea, Columbia and Panama, the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement (TPP) will become the single most important US trade initiative, serving as a building block for a larger Free Trade Area for the Asia Pacific Agreement.

After accusing the U.S. Chamber of Commerce of using foreign funding for election ads, Democrats should answer the same charges about whether organized labor is using foreign money to elect Democrats this November.