International Periscope

A Man on a Mission
Billionaire George Soros has assigned himself a daunting mission: persuade Americans to renounce the idea of a "war on terror." NEWSWEEK's Susanna Schrobsdorff spoke to Soros—who has a new book out called "The Age of Fallibility"—about his quest.

American public opinion on Iraq has changed.
People in America now realize that the invasion of Iraq was a disaster. But we still think that the war on terror is the way to deal with the terrorist threat. But it's a counterproductive policy that has done untold damage to our standing in the world and to ourselves.

Democrats in Congress are pushing for a timetable for the withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq. Do you think that's wise?
It think it's probably unwise to have a specific timetable, because while we must withdraw as soon as we can, we must withdraw in an orderly fashion. We are sitting on an incipient civil war. And it could actually deteriorate into a regional war, which could then destabilize the whole Middle East.

How is the situation in the Middle East affecting the global economy?
We are facing a global energy crisis which is very complex because it has many ingredients, starting with global warming and the peaking of oil discoveries. And there's the dependence of many of the major industrial countries on sources of energy from politically unstable areas of the world and the behavior of some of the energy-rich countries, like Iran and Venezuela and Russia, exploiting the high price of oil and their control of the supply. So we are in fact in a global energy crisis. That instability has certainly added $20 to $30 to the price of oil.

World Cup: The Agony of Defeat
Passionate fans hate it when their team loses in the World Cup. And according to new research, investors are no different. After looking at 30 years of results from international tournaments involving 39 different countries, Alex Edmans at MIT and his coauthors found that on average, a first-round loss by a national team produces a drop of 0.38 percent in the value of that country's stock market the next day. For elimination games, the average loss is 0.49 percent. In a country like Britain, 0.49 percent translates to nearly $12 billion, more than the combined value of every team in the English Premier League. That doesn't mean that the lack of early upsets this year meant bullish times for the traditional powers, however. In fact, stock markets in countries like Argentina, Brazil and Italy trended down after World Cup play began on June 9, despite the teams' early success. Edmans points out that this tracks with his findings showing that the positive emotions churned up by a win don't usually move markets the way the rage unleashed by a loss does.

—John Sparks