“Russia Silences Tabloid” By Carl Schreck The National (UAE) "The fall of The eXile, which launched the career of Matt Taibbi, a political correspondent for Rolling Stone magazine, marks the end of perhaps the world's most unique publishing project." "Irreverent mix of vicious humour, sharp political analysis and shameless hedonism" "11 years of scorched-earth Gonzo […]
Afghanistan has found itself all over the news so much lately that you’d think it was running for President of the United States. On that regard, when was the last time John McCain went to Afghanistan to assess the situation, we know he's been to Iraq on many occasions, and what about Barack Obama, has […]
It's a little unnerving to think that 17 years of Russian history can be distilled into one bad 90s Swedish pop song. [kml_flashembed movie=”http://www.youtube.com/v/HMKahowfB_E” width=”425″ height=”350″ wmode=”transparent” /] Yet the struggles between business and the state, between Putin and Khodorkovsky, between liberals and siloviki, between the democrats and the Kremlin, far from being epic ideological […]
Still staying on the issue of Russia, Mark Dillen, head of an international public affairs consultancy and blog writer for FPA's 2008 Presidential Election and Public Diplomacy blogs, attended and discussed the World Affairs Council of Northern California's annual conference which featured a ‘Reading Russia’ series. Dillen discusses that most of the scholars present were […]
“The owl of Minerva flies at dusk”, the philosopher Hegel, wearing only a false moustache and flapping his arms, liked to whisper conspiratorily to terrified passers-by. (No wonder his last words were: "Only one man had ever understood me, and he didn't understand me”. But I digress.) Just so, I am having a very difficult […]
A few days ago we discussed newly minted Russian President, Dmitri Medvedev's first foreign visit to Kazakhstan, but equally if not more important to the CA region and the world at large is where he went next, China. He met with Chinese President Hu Jintao and Premier Wen Jiabao in a visit that was both […]
Not to be outdone by yesterday's tennis ‘interviews’ in the Daily Telegraph, this Sunday's New York Times front page photo made sure no-one skipped straight to the magazine section: “Free and Flush, Russians Eager to Roam Abroad”, the headline beamed, in case anyone might also be interested in reading the accompanying article, which happened to […]
“They very rarely looked like endangering the Russian goal, Greece. There's no doubt the better team won today, Russia showed good pace and got forward well and they are a young, quick team who are only going to get better and better.” BBC Radio 5 Live pundit Pat Nevin
The English may accuse Russia of bad sportsmanship in the boardroom, but they certainly wouldn't mind taking a bit of a corporate raiding from the new crop of Soviet bloc sportswomen. A series of ‘interviews’ to “assess the changes on court” was The Daily Telegraph's highly plausible excuse to “meet eight rising stars from the […]
Sorry for the silence! Been away celebrating Russia's Independence Day…from itself. (It is true: 12 June marked the secession of the Russian republic from the USSR. Not only is the occasion modishly Freudian, but it's also simply a matter of justice: the US has an independence day, and so is Russia to be left without […]
Here in the United States, the world's largest and in many ways most dynamic economy, everyday we open the morning papers lately just to see one more sign that our economy is in trouble; credit crisis, stimulus packages, unemployment, gas/oil prices, food prices, a movie in New York City costs $12.00! America is not alone […]
On May 22, new Russian President Dmitri Medvedev made his first foreign diplomatic visit of his term to Astana, Kazakhstan. This gesture shows to the Astana's government, China, US, and the world that Russia sees great importance in its relations with this CA/CIS power, but also the region as a whole. Medvedev stated; “Astana did […]
Today, Mark Ames, the editor of the embattled Russian dissident paper The eXile (whose plight this Blog has been morbidly following) writes for the first time about the harrowing ordeal in an article for Radar Magazine. It is required reading. In addition to the Limonov factor, he sheds some more light on the possible causes […]
Republican presidential nominee John McCain is well known for his adversarial, even anachronistic, approach to Russia. Straight talk, right? Perhaps. But, asks Mark Benjamin today on Salon.com, could his bluster have had less to do with the Republican base than with the lobbying connections of a close advisor? The architect behind McCain's hard-line Russia policy, […]
With an International Donor's Conference being held in Paris next week on Afghanistan's behalf, increasing pressure is being put on President Karzai's ability to run the still unstable nation's government. The donor's aid is expected to target the sector's of agriculture, energy, security and education, but a number of them are demanding that the conference […]