Donald Trump had to be tricked out of killing a U.S.-South Korean trade deal? He threatened to move a U.S. missile defense system from South Korea to Oregon? He ordered a plan for a pre-emptive attack on North Korea?

These supposed moves by Trump, detailed in journalist Bob Woodward’s new book, will cause bafflement and worry among government officials in Seoul. But, for many South Koreans, they just add more pieces of evidence to an established picture of an erratic U.S. leader who thinks little of an alliance forged in the turmoil of the Korean War and often described here as a “bond of blood.”

“South Koreans have already seen Trump’s childish behavior many times,” an editorial writer for the conservative Chosun Ilbo, South Korea’s most-read newspaper, wrote in a column Friday about Woodward’s book, comparing the president to a “rugby ball that could bounce anywhere” if not watched by others.

South Korea, before Trump, had become used to regular, glowing declarations from U.S. leaders of both political parties about the eternal strength of their alliance. The country, after all, is a global success story, rising from the poverty and destruction of the war into Asia’s fourth-biggest economy; it’s a regional bulwark of democratic, capitalist values and a leader in culture, trade and good works.

So long before Woodward’s book, South Koreans were shocked at Trump’s open complaints about the costs of maintaining the 28,500 U.S. troops stationed in South Korea as protection against North Korean attack; at his decision, after his June summit with North Korean…

The wounding of a leading Brazilian presidential candidate has the potential to reshape the election contest after dramatically exposing the deep polarization in Latin America’s largest nation.

Far-right congressman Jair Bolsonaro, a former army captain who has promised to crack down on crime, has long argued that Brazil is in chaos and needs a strong hand to be steadied.

After a knife-wielding man stabbed the candidate in the abdomen during a campaign event Thursday, Brazilians surged on to social media to argue over whether the attack supports Bolsonaro’s assertions that the country is off the rails or whether his heated rhetoric contributed to inciting the attack.

Dr. Luiz Henrique Borsato, who performed emergency surgery on the candidate, said Bolsonaro’s recovery so far was “satisfactory.” He said the candidate would remain hospitalized for at least a week after a two-hour operation to stop serious internal bleeding.

In numerous videos posted on social media of the moment of the attack, Bolsonaro could be seen on the shoulders of a supporter, looking out at the crowd and giving a thumbs up with his left hand. He is seen flinching and then goes out of view. Other videos show supporters carrying him to a car and hitting a man who was apparently the attacker.

A suspect, identified by authorities as 40-year-old Adelio Bispo de Oliveira, was arrested within seconds.

Police did not give a motive, but one official said the man appeared to be mentally unstable.

“Our agents there said the attacker said he was ‘on a mission from God,’” Luis Boudens, president of the…

Even two decades after he fled North Korea, even with an abiding hatred of the ruling dictatorship, Sim Ju-il sometimes still relives the days when he goose-stepped past the nation’s revered founder, Kim Il Sung, as a young man. Alone on a Seoul street, he’ll pretend his umbrella is a rifle and present arms as he lifts his now aged legs in a rigid, still springy march and remembers the long-ago, exalted feeling.

“I was proud of myself because not too many people got to take part in these marches, and I still have that pride,” said Sim, 67, who participated in military parades in 1972 and 1985 — first as a goose-stepper and later riding on a military vehicle — before later defecting to South Korea. “I think North Korean military parades are the best in the world.”

Ahead of a massive military parade Sunday to mark the 70th anniversary of the founding of North Korea’s socialist government, there are mixed feelings among ex-North Korean soldiers who goose-stepped in previous years’ parades. Pride, for some like Sim, but bitterness among others who say they were beaten, battered and malnourished during intense training sessions that never seemed to end. There’s also acknowledgement that the privilege of marching in one of the North’s premier events guaranteed speedy promotion and higher social standing.

Another former North Korean goose-stepper, Kim Jungah, was once proud of her marching but now feels she was physically abused. Still, she, too, sometimes dusts off her goose-stepping skills for South Koreans curious about the harsh training she experienced ahead…

The water bottle could be from Los Angeles, the food container from Manila, and the plastic bag from Shanghai.

But whatever its specific source, almost all of the trash in the infamous Great Pacific Garbage Patchcomes from countries around the Pacific Rim.

Concerned about the millions of tons of garbage in the patch – a floating blob of trash halfway between California and Hawaii that’s twice the size of Texas – the Ocean Cleanup project is sending out a giant floating trash collector to try to scoop it up. The first of its cleanup systems launches Saturday near San Francisco.

It’s a daunting task: The patch includes about 1.8 trillion pieces of trash and weighs 88,000 tons – the equivalent of 500 jumbo jets.

And while many scientists say it’s great that people are trying to clean up the patch, others say most of our efforts should instead go towards stopping the out-of-control flow of plastic garbage into the ocean.

How much more? Try putting 95 percent of our efforts on stopping plastic from entering the ocean, and only 5 percent on cleanup, says Richard Thompson, head of the International Marine Litter Research Unit at the University of Plymouth in the United Kingdom.

Thompson said a massive, global-scale effort is needed to combat the problem, one that includes contributions from individuals, policymakers and industry. “The way we use plastics – from design, to use to disposal – must be done more efficiently and in a more environmentally friendly manner.”

George Leonard, chief scientist with the Ocean Conservatory, said that “the clock is…