Tag: Vladimir Putin

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international affairs media and media people

Gain of Dysfunction

Under-Secretary of State Victoria Nuland

Early in Putin’s war, rumors and assertions and “memes” about Russian forces attacking U.S. bioweapons labs in Ukraine quickly spread online.

The corporate press’s “official” “fact” “checkers” mocked the idea, of course. 

But then something … inconvenient … happened. Senator Marco Rubio asked Under-​Secretary of State Victoria Nuland point blank: “Does Ukraine have chemical and biological weapons?”

Her response was not, as Glenn Greenwald notes, what he was expecting. “Ukraine has biological research facilities,” she answered,* “which, we are now in fact quite concerned that Russian troops, Russian forces, may be seeking to gain control of, so we are working with the Ukrainians on how they can prevent any of those research materials from falling into the hands of Russian forces should they approach.”

It turns out that the United States has long been working with Ukraine “to consolidate and secure pathogens and toxins of security concern and to continue to ensure Ukraine can detect and report outbreaks caused by dangerous pathogens before they pose security or stability threats.” And the relationship between defensive biological research and offensive is quite close, Greenwald suggests: “research that is classified as ‘defensive’ can easily be converted, deliberately or otherwise, into extremely destructive biological weapons.”

If this is at all puzzling, note those fact-​checkers, again. These “defensive” warriors in the memetic arena are supposed to serve as antibodies to “misinformation” in the realm of spreadable ideas. By reflexively debunking any new attack on accepted government-​approved opinion, they serve as spreaders of their own misinformation.

As in the war of ideas, so in the war of biological contagions.

The next question is: Does it make sense to place our labs on the border of our enemy?

But then, I thought it was a bad idea to subsidize biological research laboratories in Wuhan, China.

Our leaders think they know better.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

* Greenwald leaves in Nuland’s uh-stutters and the like. I’ve cut them.

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term limits

Putin (and Householder) for Life

Putin, term limits, power,

For the last 20 years, Vladimir V. Putin has served (himself) as either Russian president or prime minister, switching offices to get around the nation’s term limits. 

“In the past, Mr. Putin proceeded cautiously, seeking to preserve a veneer of legitimacy,” explains The New York Times. “Confronting term limits in 2008, Mr. Putin opted for a four-​year hiatus as prime minister while his protégé, Dmitri A. Medvedev, became the caretaker president.”

Required to step down in 2024, at the close of his second consecutive six-​year term, Putin is not leaving. 

Legislation proposed and passed this week by the Duma, if approved by Russia’s Constitutional Court and by voters in an April plebiscite, would re-​start the autocrat’s term limits clock, allowing the 67-​year-​old to stay in power until 2036 … to the ripe old age of 83. 

Putin told the Duma that someday “presidential authority in Russia will not be, as they say, so personified — not so bound up in a single person,” but that day is clearly not at hand.

“If he serves until then,” the Times informs, “Mr. Putin will have held the nation’s highest office for 32 years, longer than Stalin but still short of Peter the Great, who reigned for 43 years.”

The Times also notes that “Mr. Putin joined President Xi Jinping of China and President Recep Tayyip Erdogan of Turkey, authoritarian leaders who have extended their rule.”

Not mentioned? Ohio’s Republican House Speaker Larry Householder,* who calls his state’s voter-​enacted term limits “pretty oppressive,” and is pushing an initiative amendment for this November’s ballot that will do in Ohio precisely what is being done in Russia: ignore all previous years in office, allowing Householder to hold power through 2036. 

Just like Putin. Two pols in a pod.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

* Mr. Householder’s GOP credentials are somewhat questionable. A recent headline asks, “Will the Marriage Last Between Larry Householder and Democrats?”

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Putin, term limits, power,

Photo by Global Panorama

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media and media people national politics & policies

In, Over and About

Putin, election, interference,

Sometimes losing track of a story pays off.

Last week, Facebook and Twitter and that minor player, the “major” news media, erupted with Democrats glorying in and gloating over and harrumphing about a story from Reliable Liar & Leaker Adam Schiff — I think that may be his semi-​official position in the House of Representatives. 

Schiff’s office confirmed that the House Intelligence Committee — which, in fact, Schiff chairs — had been briefed on February 13th to the effect that Russia favors the Trump Administration and will again, this year, ‘interfere’ in U.S. presidential elections. 

Meanwhile, Senator Bernie Sanders, who is running for the presidency as a Democrat but who calls himself a ‘democratic socialist’ (but of whom Nobel Laureate in Amnesia Paul Krugman dubs a mere ‘social democrat’) … well, he got in the news with the story that he had been briefed with “intelligence” that Russia was trying to throw the race towards him. Sanders sputtered his protests.

In 2016, it has been determined, Russian operatives had placed lame social media ‘memes’ into the political mill, impressing no one at the time, but scandalizing Democrats after the ‘inexplicable’ loss of their much-​hated candidate, Hillary Clinton.

Perhaps they are priming their Excuse Reservoir for another ignominious defeat?

Anyway, last week I was so distracted that I did not comment on the whole story. Which, conveniently, has now received enough “pushback,” denials and contradictions to close the chapter on it.

In record time, it was over.

That’s about it.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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Putin, election, interference,

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Accountability free trade & free markets general freedom media and media people national politics & policies responsibility too much government

Working for Whom?

Rand Paul, John McCain, Vladimir Putin, balanced budget, spending cap

Two articles on Sen. Rand Paul appeared in my Reason feed the other day. Up top. 

So it was hard not to look. 

They were “John McCain: It ‘Wasn’t Incorrect’ to Say Rand Paul Was ‘Working for Vladimir Putin’” and “Rand Paul’s Plan to Balance the Budget by 2023 Will Get a Senate Vote This Week.”

The latter story is the bigger one, of course. In it, Eric Boehm asked, “Do Republicans have the guts to impose strict spending caps?”

His answer was “probably not.” Good guess.

“Passing the Kentucky Republican’s so-​called ‘Penny Plan’ would be a dramatic reversal for Congress,” Boehm wrote, “which earlier this year approved enormous spending hikes that busted Obama-​era spending caps and threaten to put the country on pace for a $1 trillion annual deficits.… Paul tells Politico that it will be a ‘litmus test for Republicans who claim to be conservative, but are only too happy to grow the federal government and increase our debt.’”

I am afraid the litmus paper has turned … red. As in red ink. As in accumulating debt till we drop.

Yesterday Paul’s plan was voted down, 21 – 76.

In the other Reason piece, Matt Welch noted that Arizona’s senior senator stands by his calumny, last year, against Kentucky’s junior senator. Paul had delayed “ratification of Montenegro’s entry into the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO).” McCain, a gung-​ho NATO expansion proponent, accused Paul of “working for Vladimir Putin.”

If Putin really seethes with ill will towards America, wouldn’t he want to see the country burdened with debt? 

So, on this vote, those 76 senators who didn’t “stand with Rand” are undoubtedly working for Putin.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

 

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Photo of Rand Paul by Gage Skidmore | Photo of John McCain from Wikimedia Commons

 

Categories
general freedom moral hazard national politics & policies responsibility

The Russians Are Coming

Russia, Putin, Trump, horseback, illustration

There’s no accounting for taste, especially regarding humor.

For instance, the 1966 film “The Russians Are Coming, the Russians Are Coming” is, to me, a classic. And I think Donald Trump’s recent sarcasm — “Russia, if you’re listening, I hope you’re able to find the 30,000 emails that are missing.” — was funny.

And surprisingly appropriate to the situation.

Did the Russians give WikiLeaks the hacked DNC emails? We don’t know.

Was Trump malevolently, traitorously standing in the middle of Fifth Avenue inviting a foreign adversary to criminally cyber-​attack his political opponent, as hyped? No.

Still, I’m not copasetic with Trump’s apparent buddy-​fest with Russian President — and thug — Vladimir Putin. Yet, Trump is hardly the first American politician to act the fool before Putin.

Republican President George W. Bush bizarrely claimed to have looked into Putin’s soul. It was cloudy that day.

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton jetted over to the Kremlin with a silly “Reset” button. Still, friendly Russian interests have been financially generous to the Clintons.

Russia bailed out President Obama (and Assad) after Syria crossed Obama’s apparently evanescent red line. Recall that open microphone that caught Obama telling outgoing Russian President Dmitry Medvedev to let Putin know, “After my election, I have more flexibility.”

Vladimir Putin must wonder how his Soviet forebears could have possibly lost the Cold War to a country led by such ninnies.

In 2012, Republican Mitt Romney called Russia our number one geopolitical foe … only to be ridiculed by Obama and mocked in the media. “The 1980s are now calling to ask for their foreign policy back,” scoffed a contemptuous Obama. Current Secretary of State John Kerry called it a “preposterous notion.”

Since then, Russia has annexed Crimea, made war in eastern Ukraine and occasionally bombed U.S. forces in Syria.

The Baltic nations, some of which have significant Russian minorities, understandably feel threatened. America has pledged to militarily defend these tiny countries bordering Russia.

But no discussion of that on the campaign trail.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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Russia, Putin, Trump, horseback, illustration

 

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Accountability folly ideological culture too much government

Pot, Kettle; Obama, Putin

President Calvin Coolidge looks more like a sage every day. Confucius would’ve been proud of Silent Cal. Today’s top politicians might take a cue from the man: When you don’t have much to say, say nothing.

President Barack Obama, whose popularity in America up until recently rested, in part, on his sounding more intelligent than his predecessor in office, had the reckless temerity — the audacity of dope, perhaps — to float the notion, in an interview the other day, that Russia’s top banana Vladimir Putin had made a “strategic mistake” by annexing Crimea, and said the latter-​day Tsar was “not so smart”:

Those thinking his Russian counterpart was a “genius” had been proven wrong by Russia’s economic crisis, he said.

For my part, I hope that a collapsed economy in Russia is the least we have to fear. The story isn’t over, and I wouldn’t be gloating over a half-​hatched batch of eggs just yet.

Which brings to mind the title cliché: pot and kettle, each calling the other black. Here we have a world leader with a horrible economic track record, in addition to a chaotic diplomatic strategy, calling his chief competitor for public adoration (yes, Putin’s acolytes are just as besotted as Obama’s) something of a fool.

Well, the man so involved with a disaster to have it named after him, Obamacare, and who hailed extravagant “stimulus” as a cure for a depression that still lingers — reminding us again of the longest Depression, the Great, and the wrong-​headed policies of Hoover and FDR — should know when to keep mum.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.