Other than all being gamekeepers turned poacher – establishment figures, including but not confined to the military, now sternly critical of their countries’ elites and media narratives – what do the following have in common: Jacques Baud, Karen Kwiotkowski, Douglas … Read More »
It’s difficult to ascertain the level of seriousness of French President Emmanuel Macron’s threat to send 2,000 of his country’s forces into Ukraine. In early March I wrote that: It’s the highest level admission yet that an underequipped, undertrained and … Read More »
Spoiler alert. In Kurt Vonnegut’s Cat’s Cradle, the fictitious Caribbean island of San Lorenzo is ruled by dictator “Papa” Monzano; a fierce opponent of Bokononism. Indeed, Bokononists risk death by impalement if caught engaging in the cult’s most sacred ritual … Read More »
Events are conspiring to keep me in Ukraine. Today being Easter Monday for non-Orthodox Christians – but still a month away for Russians and Ukrainians, Ethiopians, Greeks and Serbs – I’d intended to post on the 1916 Easter Rising against … Read More »
It’s been my consistent assertion since February 2022 that the West, its deeply unimpressive leaders more beholden to equally poor leaders in Washington than to their own citizens, set out to goad Russia into its military operation in Ukraine. No … Read More »
The Economist today, March 25 2024 It gets boring I know. Sometimes I bore myself but I can’t overstate the importance of taking it to heart that on matters crucial to the oligarchs who beneath a chimera of democracy rule … Read More »
After two Russia posts in a row, on media coverage of Vladimir Putin’s election victory and on Russia’s return to great power status, I’d thought to write a third on that subset of Russia’s critics – including but not confined … Read More »
Even while rubber tramping the northwest fens, I was mulling over this abrupt departure. It’s not the first time of course. She also left the State Department in January 2017, when Donald Trump took office with declared intent – soon … Read More »
It’s rare for me to have a good word for Piers Morgan, a combative corporate media interviewer in his way reminiscent of Jeremy Paxman, while I often cite approvingly Professor Mearsheimer. A leading exponent of political realism, his prescient warnings … Read More »
These are momentous times. Lenin’s remark – “there are decades where nothing happens, and weeks where decades happen” – never rang truer. Take the past week. We saw – some of us literally – an extraordinary act of sacrifice by … Read More »