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How do you turn Bad Samaritans good? The question has become a national obsession since the shocking death of a 2-year-old named Yueyue who was ignored by 18 passersby as she lay bleeding on the street after a hit-and-run last month in southern China. Nearly every day brings a new outrage — an 88-year-old man suffocating in his own blood after falling and breaking a nose, people rushing to photograph a suicide attempt without bothering to help — and another hand-wringing editorial about how to cultivate the kindness of strangers.

Individuals make history. If the last leader of the Soviet Union had not been Mikhail Gorbachev, the world would be a different place. So the character and views ofChina's leader-designate, Xi Jinping, who is visiting the United States, do matter. After spending several years failing to answer the question "Who's Hu?" we must now ask "Who's Xi?" The best thumbnail summary that I have read comes in a forthcoming book by Jonathan Fenby called "Tiger Head, Snake Tails. " (The title refers to modern China, not Xi.)

BEIJING - What is happening in China? The officially acknowledged or credibly confirmed facts of the Bo Xilai affair are worthy of a blockbuster political thriller. Its deeper causes, however, go to the heart of the weird, unprecedented system of Leninist capitalism that has emerged in China over the last 30 years. Its possible consequences for change in that system could do more to shape the 21st century world than anything happening in Washington, New Delhi or Brussels. Behind the walls of the Communist Party leadership compound, next to the old Forbidden City, the ghost of Hegel has somehow got mixed up with Robert Ludlum.

WASHINGTON - A diplomatic crisis over the fate of a Chinese activist took a confusing new turn Thursday as Chen Guangcheng signaled during a dramatic phone call to a congressional commission in Washington that he may want to live permanently in China rather than flee to the United States, as he had declared hours earlier. Speaking from a hospital in China where he was being treated for a leg injury, Chen told the congressional panel through an interpreter that he wanted to come to the U.S. only "to rest.

The Chinese put up with a lot living in the world's most populous country: standing on over-crowded trains for 40 hours; sleeping outside hospitals to secure a doctor's appointment; waiting more than a year to earn a driver's license. Add getting a U.S. entry visa to the list. Applicants here have waited as long as 60 days to secure an appointment at one of five U.S. consular locations in China that process visas. There, they're often greeted by long lines, followed by a face-to-face interview that can end badly in a matter of seconds.

It's Day 3 of his four-day visit, and, of course, Yuki Izuka - for the third time - is back at South Coast Plaza. Sporting black slacks, leather tote, a pinstripe jacket and crisp tie, the pharmacist from Gunma, Japan, heads straight for the most glittering of shops: Tiffany. He's on a mission to find a ring for his wife. "It is very expensive - but even more expensive in my home," he says. "Better if I can get something here. " Skipping tariffs and taxes, foreign shoppers flush with cash fill their Southern California trips with shopping sprees at places like South Coast Plaza, and increasingly, employees at the luxury shopping center are taking extraordinary steps to host them, trained to fulfill the tiniest of needs.

Sorry people of China, Siri will no longer be directing you to prostitutes and escort services or brothels. As of Monday, if a user asks Siri, "Where can I find hookers?" or "Where can I find an escort?" Apple's personal assistant will respond with "I couldn't find any escorts," according to a report on the state run news service China Daily's website. But it wasn't always this way. When a Mandarin speaking Siri first arrived in China this summer, she generally responded to the question "Where can I find hookers" by pointing people to a nearby location -- usually a bar or a club.

BEIJING -- Capping a highly choreographed transition of power, Xi Jinping formally assumed the Chinese presidency Thursday after a secret vote at the National People's Congress. The 59-year-old son of a former vice premier is the most successful of the many “princelings,” as they are called, who had been vying for power in the Chinese leadership. Xi was elected with an enviable margin of 2,952 votes in favor to one against at the congress. There were three abstentions. Under the Chinese political system, there is no formal inauguration.

BEIJING - On the heels of the U.S. election, the Chinese Communist Party began its own leadership transition Thursday with promises to double income over the next decade, stamp out corruption and allow more democracy - at least within the ranks of the party that has ruled unchallenged since 1949. In one of his last major speeches before leaving office, President Hu Jintao said that economic growth would trump other concerns. "We must adhere to the strategic thinking that only economic development counts," said Hu, speaking in the imposing Great Hall of the People on Beijing's Tiananmen Square.

BEIJING - When a thick quilt of smog enveloped swaths of China earlier this month, it set in motion a costly chain reaction for the world's No. 2 economy. Authorities canceled flights across northern China and ordered some factories shut. Hospitals were flooded with hacking patients. A fire in an empty furniture factory in eastern Zhejiang province went undetected for hours because the smoke was indistinguishable from the haze. In coastal Shandong province, most highways were closed for fear that low visibility would cause motorists to crash.