Tag Archives: Russia

Political Rants

Twilight of empire.

United Nations week is always entertaining on some level. Probably the best moments of this go ’round involved the usual great power hypocrisy. Putin talking about Assad’s “valiant” fight against the terrorists – that’s a bit over the top. But no one beats the U.S. in this category. Obama delivered cautionary rhetoric about how a world that can countenance Russian interference in eastern Ukraine would be setting a dangerous precedent:

… we cannot stand by when the sovereignty and territorial integrity of a nation is flagrantly violated. If that happens without consequence in Ukraine, it could happen to any nation gathered here today.

Imagine, great nations feeling as though they can intervene in other nations at will, in service to their own purported national interests. Whoever heard of such a thing?

This Obama. Not this one.One can only guess what was running through the minds of so many members of the General Assembly when they listened to this balderdash, particularly those who have been on the receiving end of American military and economic power. Sure, it’s heavy handed and gratuitous for Russia to start bombing parts of western Syria. I imagine there are countries who have sufficient moral standing to take issue with that. The United States is not one of them. We haven’t a leg to stand on in that regard, and the fact that we complain the loudest about Russia’s action is a bit too much like the kleptomaniac yelling “Thief!”

Set aside the fact that Russia is the tenth country to drop bombs on Syria, or that we were more than willing to overlook Turkey’s attack on Kurdish forces (who were fighting ISIS) so long as Ankara pledged some level of strategic cooperation. We Americans have nothing to say on this issue. Look at every country we have “helped” in the greater middle east, north Africa, south Asia swath of territory that makes up a large portion of the Muslim world. Every one is a failed state or the next worst thing. Afghanistan is spinning apart, as is Iraq. Yemen is in pieces, now being bombed by our closest Arab ally. Libya is no more. Pakistan is teetering on the brink. When has our intervention ever helped anyone over the last sixty years?

Oregon Shooting. Disgusted beyond belief. I’m with the president on this one. We’re just too dysfunctional to govern ourselves.

The Pope and the Clerk. Francis met with that religious zealot town clerk from Kentucky. Total dick move. Not sure who’s idea that was, but fuck, that was stupid.

luv u,

jp

Political Rants

The year (2014) that was.

It’s the end of the year, and news organizations far and wide are doing their annual retrospective clip shows. From a production standpoint they are a terrific money saver, no doubt, which would explain why the various networks seem so enthusiastic about it. This is the week when you get a distillation of the year’s worst reporting; a big ball of conventional wisdom, served up on a plate. Open wide!

NPR’s Morning Edition – as reliable a servant of empire as any imperial bureaucrat could hope for – wasted no words in putting one of the world’s most dangerous conflicts into the proper context:

You can learn a lot about 2014 by tracing the story of one man, Vladimir Putin. The Russian leader hosted the Winter Olympics proudly showing off a place that’s near and dear to him, the Black Sea Resort of Sochi. But the feeling of global goodwill there disappeared so quickly. Putin infuriated the West by annexing Crimea then he stirred a deadly conflict in Eastern Ukraine.The West imposed sanctions, and there’s been talk of a new Cold War. But at home, even with his economy tanking, Putin remains popular.

This just in from Empire News.

That’s David Greene, now Morning Edition co-host and formerly one of NPR’s correspondents in eastern Europe. Here he is joining his colleagues at all the major news networks parroting the administration line about the crisis in Ukraine, making it a story about Putin rather than a story about a decades-long conflict over economic and military policy on the continent. This is a lead-in to a conversation with Peter Pomerantsev, a Russian-born writer at The Atlantic, in which they dissect the phenomenon of the manipulative Russian leader, pointing out the appalling fact that the Russian government is (gasp!) “choreograph(ing) politics to make Putin look good.” Whoever heard of such an outrage!

They followed this edifying conversation with a story from two NPR European correspondents illustrating how Putin’s government is offering support to right-wing opposition parties across Europe, delivering funding in a way that would be illegal within the borders of Russia. In other words, NPR has made the astonishing discovery that Russia does exactly what we do in nations all around the world – sluice money into opposition groups, support opposition candidates with money and other resources, and insert ourselves into their political process in a manner forbidden by U.S. law if someone were to try it here. In fact, this is precisely what we’ve been doing in Ukraine as part of our efforts to integrate them into the European trading bloc and, ultimately, NATO.

With a long history of devastating invasions from the West, that’s a non-starter for Russia, just as Mexico’s entry into a foreign military alliance would be frowned upon in Washington. But far be it from NPR or any other major corporate news organization to report on that. That would require stepping out of line ever so slightly. Never going to happen.

luv u,

jp

Political Rants

New cold war on tap.

The full-court press is on. The Obama team has been channeling Bush/Romney for the past couple of weeks, delivering on the promise of a more aggressive foreign policy on several fronts, most ominously (in my humble opinion) in far eastern Europe, on the indefensible frontiers of U.S./European capitalism and military hegemony. Obama has announce that we will be taking part in NATO exercises in western Ukraine; roughly the equivalent of Russia or China or Iran doing the same in western Cuba, except that Russia has been attacked ruinously by foreign alliances via their western frontier twice over the last century. (The same, of course, cannot be said of us and our southern frontier.)

This is the threat to world peace?At the close of the Cold War, it was understood that expansion of NATO would be seen as provocative by Russia, but because Russia was in a weak position, their economy destroyed by massive privatization, shock therapy structural adjustment, guided by some of our Chicago-school fanatics, we felt free to ignore their concerns. That worked so long as our drunken ally Yeltsin was in command. But now that the extremely powerful Russian presidency (which we supported under Yeltsin) has been inherited by a sober ex-KGB officer, and the Russian economy has been lifted somewhat by oil revenues, they have found the confidence to voice their objections. And, of course, we’re shocked, shocked!

I’ve never been a fan of Putin (even when our government was), but if this “Russian aggression” as I’ve heard on radio and television for several weeks now, it’s not very, well, aggressive. Sure, they’re helping their allies in eastern Ukraine, now under attack from Kiev, just as we massively intervene on the side of governments and movements all over the world. Putin, for all of his foibles, at least has a definable national interest to invoke in Ukraine. What’s our excuse in Afghanistan, Yemen, Iraq, etc., etc.? Much more abstract, to say the least.

Why are we looking for this fight? And if we are, how can we accuse anyone else of being a threat to world peace?