Russian Fascism in Action: Teaching Ukrainian Kids

September 16, 2022 If you wondered why the Ukrainians are working out prison terms for teachers who either came from Russia or are Ukrainians but agreed to teach the Russian curriculum in the occupied territories, this video can explain it better than anything I could have written. In this video, the teacher -- who appears …

The Kremlin’s Fairy-Tales & Dugina’s Assassination

August 23, 2022 Hi Friends. There have been a few developments that warrant a new post on the war in Ukraine. A few days ago, Turkey's Erdogan had a meeting with Zelenskyy after talking to Putin in Sochi. The meeting lasted 40 minutes, and both sides would only says they talked about generalities. We now …

Atrocities and the Slow Death of Russia, Part 2

August 4, 2022 In my previous post, I discussed two recent events that speak to the barbaric nature of this war, especially as practiced by the Russians. (Incidentally, you can read a fascinating report about how The Insider and Bellingcat discovered the identity of the perpetrator in the castration video and the location of the …

Russia is bogging down, schism in the Church

May 29, 2022 I did not write any updates for a few days because, like everyone else, I am in a holding pattern -- waiting to see when the Russians will call it quits on the Easter Offensive, and whether they will achieve any of the much-reduced goals of the invasion. There have been very …

Russia’s aims/justifications for the war, evolving

May 9, 2022 I have spent some time talking about Russia's changing aims in its war on Ukraine, but perhaps we should take some stock of the evolving justifications for the war. As you will recall, in his declaration of war -- sorry, "special operation" -- Putin talked about Ukraine being a fictitious country, and …

Brief flare of truth in Russian media

May 9, 2022 Two journalists at lenta.ru published over 10 articles critical of the war and the Russian government. The articles were quickly removed -- but not before getting archived -- and the journalists were fired although the publication claimed that the site had been hacked. One of journalists commented that there had been no …

Ukrainian and Russian Nazi collaborators in WWII

May 6, 2022 Quite a lot of Russian propaganda centers on Stepan Bandera, with the derogative "banderovtsi" (Banderistas) being used interchangeably with fascists and Nazis. (Kadyrov's fighters in Ukraine are hunting for Bandera, and just recently claimed to have killed him. He died in 1959.) This is not a post about Bandera but about the …

How to lie like a pro: Lavrov to China

May 5, 2022 Russia's Foreign Minister Lavrov gave an interview to the Chinese news agency Xinhua. Here are some interesting tidbits, with commentary. What is at the root of the Ukrainian crisis?NATO’s reckless expansion to the East was a key component of those actions, despite the political obligations to the Soviet leadership on the non-expansion …

Russia is baiting Israel

May 4, 2022 Russia has decided to provoke a rift with Israel. Lavrov started this a few days ago with some promises to the Palestinians to recognize a state with capital in Jerusalem, then the Foreign Ministry doubled down after Lavrov was called out for his idiotic remarks about Hitler having Jewish roots and Jews …

Russia’s descent into fascism: the dismantling of education

May 2, 2022 A while back I posted about a psychological support program at a major Russian university that was designed to treat students who don't exhibit sufficient patriotic fervor or a depressed by what's going on. Here's a wide survey of the educational landscape in Putin's Russia today that demonstrates fascism in full swing.