Jack Masey, a designer for the United States Information Agency whose model American kitchen, part of an exhibition in Moscow in 1959, provided the stage for an argument about communism and capitalism between Nikita S. Khrushchev and Vice President Richard M. Nixon, one of the Cold War’s most memorable confrontations, died on March 13 in Manhattan. He was 91.

North Korea today is known as the world’s most isolationist nation, an obdurate outpost of totalitarianism. [...] But the public spaces of Senegal, Ethiopia, Kenya and elsewhere are dotted with reminders of a long-running  often surreal charm offensive that was waged by the North as part of the Korean peninsula’s own Cold War. Since 1969, Pyongyang’s Mansudae Art Studio has exported statues and other monuments to at least 16 African countries.

The Voice of America and the U.S. international broadcasting community as a whole could use structural reform and more money. But that’s not why they appear to be failing miserably. No. The real failure is that they lack conviction. And without that, they will continue to appear irrelevant.

U.S. needs more money for more soft power outreach abroad, but Congress and President must first reform Broadcasting Board of Governors. [...] We don't spend enough money on U.S. government propaganda abroad now, and we did not spend enough money on it during the Cold War, but we were spending money and getting the message across much more effectively during the Cold War than we do now. 

Dana Gioia, chairperson of the National Endowment of Arts, said, "There's no American alive who has done more extensive and effective cultural diplomacy than Dave Brubeck". He was even chosen to thaw Cold War tensions, being asked to play for a series of summits between Ronald Reagan and Mikhail Gorbachev.