Diplomatic Cables Show Russia Saw NATO Expansion as a Red Line

Nearly a year in, the war in Ukraine has cost hundreds of thousands of lives and brought the world to the brink of, in President Joe Biden’s own words, “Armageddon.” Alongside the literal battlefield has been a similarly bitter intellectual battle over the war’s causes.

Diplomatic Cables Show Russia Saw NATO Expansion as a Red Line

Related:

Euromaidan 2014 – Orange Revolution – War in Donbass

On MSNBC and “Authoritarianism”

MSNBC opinion columnist Zeesham Aleem just penned the latest in what’s become a parade of hit pieces from mainstream outlets directed at me and other independent journalists. Even by the low standards of the genre, “How the populist left has become vulnerable to the populist right” is a humorous standout. It argues that after I spent a month detailing how the FBI, DHS, DOD, CIA and other agencies built a system for mass delivery of censorship requests to firms like Twitter and Facebook, I helped fuel a subculture that “could funnel people from leftism to authoritarianism.”

On MSNBC and “Authoritarianism”

On the first results of the US-Africa Leaders Summit

The world press is actively discussing the results of the first US-Africa Leaders Summit since 2014, held on December 13-15 in Washington.

At first glance this event may seem successful. The forum was attended by delegations from 49 countries plus the African Union and the permanent secretariat of the African Continental Free Trade Area. Only the leaders of those countries that were not invited because of their “non-compliance with democratic standards” (Guinea, Mali, Sudan, Burkina Faso, Eritrea) were not in attendance. It should be noted that the leader of Chad, who also came to power in an unconstitutional way, was at the summit. Apparently, his “authoritarianism” did not interfere with US principles since the country is close in its political positions to the West, primarily to France.

On the first results of the US-Africa Leaders Summit (archived)

Biden calls on Congress to impose rail contract in a major assault on workers’ democratic rights

President Biden published a statement Monday night calling on Congress to intervene to block a national rail strike and impose a contract which tens of thousands of railroad workers voted down. A few hours later, outgoing Speaker Nancy Pelosi announced the House of Representatives would take up such a bill this week and send it to the Senate with the “hope that this necessary, strike-averting legislation will earn a strongly bipartisan vote…”

Biden calls on Congress to impose rail contract in a major assault on workers’ democratic rights