This is the moment when a newspaper claiming to uphold that most essential function in a liberal democracy – acting as a watchdog on power – formally abandons the task.
Analysis
A Response to William Browder (Rachel Bauman)
In expressing his vexation with my article, Browder, who abjured his American citizenship in 1998 to become a British subject, reveals more about his own selective advocacy of democratic principles than about the film itself. He might recall that in his former homeland freedom of the press remains a cherished value.
Aaron J. Mate: Don’t Count on Russiagate to Bring Trump Down.
Robert Mueller’s questions, Michael Cohen’s troubles, and the DNC’s lawsuit don’t inspire confidence.
German Foreign Minister attacks NATO Sabre-Rattling. Good (Peter Hitchens)
Here’s an astonishing development which, in different times, would have got a lot more attention. Germany’s Foreign Minister , Frank-Walter Steinmeier has publicly warned NATO against ‘warmongering’ after it held daft and provocative military exercises in Poland, during which it pretended to have a capacity and a united political will which it simply does not possess.
Sophie Pinkham: Zombie History
Timothy Snyder’s bleak vision of the past and present.
Why Bibi and Vlad Get Along (Paul Pillar)
In a recent article on Israel’s foreign relations, Robert Danin observes that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Russian President Vladimir Putin “clearly enjoy a better relationship with each other than either does with U.S. President Barack Obama.”
Nicolai N. Petro: Russian Orthodox Church and Russian Foreign Policy
To avoid even greater tragedy in the future, we should heed the warning of America’s most venerated living specialist on Russia, the former Librarian of Congress James H. Billington: “…if we cannot learn to listen to others as they whisper their prayers, we may well confront them later on when they howl their war cries.”
PODCAST: Is the US Pursuing a Rogue Policy by Waging Undeclared War Against Russia? (Stephen F. Cohen)
Washington’s NATO buildup on Russia’s borders, its refusal to cooperate with Moscow in Syria and Ukraine, and its anti-Putin propaganda form an ominous pattern, says Nation contributing editor and ACEWA Board Member, Stephen F. Cohen.
TNI: Misplaced Fears Over Nord Stream 2
Nord Stream 2 provides another reliable route for transporting gas to Europe, nothing more, nothing less.
A Stark Nuclear Warning (Gov. Jerry Brown)
I know of no person who understands the science and politics of modern weaponry better than William J. Perry, the US Secretary of Defense from 1994 to 1997. When a man of such unquestioned experience and intelligence issues the stark nuclear warning that is central to his recent memoir, we should take heed.
Stephen F. Cohen PODCAST: America’s Collusion With Neo-Nazis
The previous 40-year experience taught that Cold War can corrupt even American democracy — politically, economically, morally. There are many examples of how the new edition has already degraded America’s media, politicians, even scholars.
Paul Robinson: Thought For The Day
In the past few years I have noticed something of a pattern. Those who complain the loudest about Russian ‘disinformation’ are often the most inaccurate in their own depictions of reality.
Brian Milakovsky: A frontline factory, an embattled oligarch and Ukraine’s industrial drift
For the future of this chemical plant in eastern Ukraine, trade policy with Russia looms large.
Is the Pentagon Hyping the Russia Threat? (The American Conservative)
While most of our foreign-policy attention is focused on the Middle East, a new danger lurks. According to a number of high-ranking Pentagon officials, that danger is not Russian aggression but rather their own colleagues, who are inflating the threat Russia poses in an effort to boost the Defense Department’s budget.
Russia the Eternal Enemy Quotations (Patrick Armstrong)
Patrick Armstrong brings us this gem from The Economist, Nov 1996: Still, a big worry is that, even under Mr Primakov’s relatively sophisticated tutelage, Russia seems unable to break free of its view of the world as a sort of zero sum game in which countries become strong only by making other countries weak. [Read more…] about Russia the Eternal Enemy Quotations (Patrick Armstrong)
DEBATE: WEDNESDAY MAY 9 IN NYC: STEPHEN F. COHEN AND MICHAEL MCFAUL
Please join The Harriman Institute and New York University’s Jordan Center for the Advanced Study of Russia for a debate between Stephen F. Cohen (Professor Emeritus of Russian Studies at New York University and Princeton University) and Michael McFaul (Professor, Department of Political Science, Stanford University) on “The New U.S.-Russian Cold War: Who is to Blame?”
Major Allegations Against Russian President Now Being Questioned (Part I)
Today we feature three items which challenge the now entrenched narrative of President Vladimir Putin-as-villain. The first of these, below, is an open letter to the British Home Secretary by the London-based academic Julia Svetlichnaja which challenges the findings of the Owen’s report which found that Vladimir Putin “probably” approved Litvinenko’s killing. [Read more…] about Major Allegations Against Russian President Now Being Questioned (Part I)
Major Allegations Against Russian President Now Being Questioned (Part II)
A new film by a longstanding critic of Vladimir Putin about the campaign to pass the Magnitsky Act by wealthy fund manager Bill Browder premiered in the US last Tuesday and conclusively demonstrates that the foreign national Browder played the US Congress and European Parliament for dupes.
Nicolai N. Petro: The Surprising Allure of Russian Soft Power
Russia sees itself as that part of the West that perceives liberal fundamentalism as futile and seeks to establish a framework of global leadership around the values that the West shares with non-Western states. Prominent political theorist Boris Mezhuev has dubbed this approach “civilizational realism.”
Major Allegations Against Russian President Now Being Questioned (Part III)
Why was everyone so willing and ready to take CrowdStrike’s claims that the Russians hacked the DNC without an ounce of skepticism in the first place?