The Image of the Enemy

cluborlov

cluborlov

During my brief winter sojourn in Russia a tiny cold war has erupted between Russia and the USA. First, Mitt Romney calls Russia “our number one enemy” during the presidential election campaign. Then, after the election, the US passes the “Magnitsky Act” which promises to arrest funds and deny visas to certain Russian officials based on a secret list. The Russian legislature then responds with the “Dima Yakovlev Bill,” named after a Russian boy who died of heat stroke after his American adoptive parents left him locked in a car for nine hours. In addition to vaguely symmetric retaliatory measures, this bill bans Americans from adopting Russian orphans. This last little add-on may initially seem rather daft as state policy, but it has some interesting properties as Russian propaganda, of which you may not be aware. Although from the US perspective this move has an inane “...or I will shoot my dog” element to it, spun around the other way it makes it look as if valiant Russian politicians are trying to stop American fiends from torturing and killing innocent Russian orphans.

Because, as you probably already know, that's what Americans are generally known to do: they torture (Abu Ghraib) and kill (60 thousand dead Syrians in that American-inspired régime change operation so far). They allow massacres of children (Sandy Hook Elementary School) and then, in a show of solidarity with the murderer, they run out and buy up the weapon (Bushmaster assault rifle) owned by the maniac who massacred the children. They invade and destabilize countries and overthrow governments (Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya). They also hold the dubious distinction of being the only country to ever drop nuclear bombs on civilians (Hiroshima, Nagasaki) and did that not even as a matter of national survival but more as a matter of convenience. And then they have the gall to lecture other countries about human rights! Obnoxious, are they not?

It should be easy to see why the anti-American button is an easy one for a Russian politician to push. Interestingly, though, pushing this button doesn't seem to achieve much of anything, and this is something that requires an explanation. To get one relatively obvious reason out of the way: the Soviets painted the Americans as the “imperialist aggressor,” and this rhetorical device wore out along with the rest of the Soviet system. A slightly less obvious reason is that many Russians are still plagued with self-loathing, as a hold-over from the national humiliation of the Soviet collapse, and, seeing their own country in an overwhelmingly negative light, automatically entertain entirely unfounded rosy notions about the United States.

But an even more subtle and more powerful reason is this: Russia is busy becoming rather US-like in lifestyle and in social organization, and foreign relations are a hindrance to the smooth running of this process. Russians now watch American TV shows (dubbed into Russian), they lap up American-style marketing and advertising, they have bought into the SUV craze, they like to shop at the new malls and big box stores, to eat out almost every night, and some (those who can afford it) are even embracing the concept of suburban sprawl by erecting mansions in places that are a long drive from city centers. Many of them want to travel to the US, or even to move there, to better soak up even more of the profligate US lifestyle (which fewer and fewer Americans can still afford). What made the Magnitsky Act effective to the point of stirring Russian politicians to action is that they really like the idea of being able to travel to the US, invest in Miami real estate, send their children to overpriced US colleges and universities and so on. It is an effective way to put pressure on them—not to stop mistreating people in detention, like Magnitsky, mind you, but to capitulate to American/transnational corporate interests. But in this the Russian politicians are conflicted: they like having access to the US, but having it would mean nothing if they weren't rich. In turn, the reason they are rich is because, under Putin, Russia has stood up to foreign interests and curbed the power of foreign companies in the crucial oil and gas business. And for this the US officialdom will never forgive them. Post-Soviet Russia was supposed to become an impoverished banana republic ruled by a pliant Western-controlled élite and serve as a playground for Western corporations, its mineral wealth there for the taking. The fact that this has failed to happen (largely thanks to Vladimir Putin) is an affront to everything the US stands for and holds sacred.

This, by the way, explains the nature of the US campaign to vilify Putin. He has been singled out for painting with the archvillain brush not because he is a ruthless dictator (the world is full of ruthless dictators that the US likes very much and actively supports, provided they play ball). The reason is that Putin, of all the national leaders out there, actually gave a reasoned, principled response to attempts at foreign political and corporate domination of Russia: something he has called “sovereign democracy.” Now, the word “democracy” gets thrown around a lot but means ever so little (more on that in a moment) but the word “sovereign” actually does carry a meaning: there is a rather short list of nation-states that one can still call fully sovereign, and all of them are, in the eyes of the Washington régime, pariah states: Iran, North Korea, Libya and Syria (formerly). They are all on the Washington's target list for régime change. Russia is actually big and powerful enough to be able to walk a fine line between being Washington's indispensable partner and guarantor of regional stability and a pariah state, and American vacillation between treating Russia as a friend or an enemy is reflective of its ambiguous position.

Now, on the question of democracy, Western media have tried their best to paint the recent Russian presidential election as riddled with fraud and therefore illegitimate. Like having the Supreme Court effectively annul election results and appoint the president by court order... oh wait, wrong country. In fact, in the elections last autumn, Putin was elected president by a landslide (he's popular, you see) for a third term, after sitting out a term as prime minister, per Russian constitution. As Putin himself pointed out, if he were a tyrant, he could have just changed the constitution. Sure, there was plenty of ballot-stuffing and other irregularities, but the more important point is that none of the other candidates posed a viable alternative to Putin, making the question of whether one likes him or not rather moot. Reminds me of another election that took place last autumn: Obama got reelected because Romney turned out to be a bit too much of a scoundrel. He is a corporate hostile takeover artist by trade, and apparently the US isn't quite ready yet for a corporate hostile takeover. (But let's check back in four years.) The other non-option was the third-party candidate Ron Paul. Now, there is an eerie similarity between these alternatives to Obama: apparently, they are all Ayn Randians.

Ayn Rand was a mediocre Russian-born novelist whose quest in life was to propagandize free market capitalism (as if that were something that one ever needs to do) and to denigrate all other forms of social organization. She stood firm against all forms of mutual aid and social support that could not be effected via the unfettered free market. The avowed free marketeers Mitt Romney and his running mate Paul Ryan definitely had Ayn Randian leanings, and it is hardly an accident that “Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan” is an anagram for “My Ultimate Ayn Rand Porn.” And what about that other non-option, Ron Paul? What did he choose to name his son? That's right, “Rand.” Now, for me, fervent passion for the works of Ayn Rand has served as an accurate litmus test for a mediocre mind. The best that Ayn Rand's thinking can offer is a way of getting in touch with one's “inner asshole”: if you are the sort of person who is driven to distraction by the idea that somebody somewhere might be getting a free lunch at public expense, Ayn Rand is there to help you nurture such feelings. Ayn Rand is beloved of America's self-styled “libertarians.” The real Libertarians were socialists, but Americans have a way of borrowing words they don't know and then using them to mean things they don't understand, like saying “football” instead of “hand-egg” and then having to say “soccer” instead of “football,” never mind that the entire world finds this unintelligent and impolite. As the character Inigo Montoya put it in the film The Princess Bride, “You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.”

So here we have a country in severe crisis (the United States) holding an important election, which should, theoretically, be over whether it should stay on course of runaway debt and government spending, or to reinvent itself and so to avoid national bankruptcy and collapse. And it turns out that all the opposition candidates it can field happen to be followers of a mediocre methamphetamine-addled Russian novelist. Now, let me ask you this: does this pathetic excuse for a democracy still have the right to lecture others about democratic governance? Perhaps the wounded beast of American democracy would be better off finding a dark place to go and lick its wounds for a couple of years.

Keep reading on  cluborlov >>

Obama Seizing Control of the US Military – Potential Cataclysm Ahead

TrevorLoudon

Barack Obama has worked with pro-Moscow Marxists including Frank Marshall Davis and Alice Palmer, and pro-Cuban radicals like Bill Ayers and Bernardine Dohrn, his entire life.

Their number one priority has always been the destruction of the US military, the only significant block remaining, to global revolution.

Now that the Davis/Palmer/Ayers/Dohrn protege has the reins of power, President Obama is working hard to destroy US military superiority, consciously or unconsciously, to the advantage of the Russia/China/Cuba/North Korea/Iranian/Islamic alliance.

From William Bigelow at Breitbart.com:

In an attempt to seize total control over national security and bypass congress, a frightening new step by the Obama Administration is coming into play. As noted in Friday’s Wall Street Journal in an op-ed by John Bolton and John Woo, a State Department advisory group that is run by former Secretary of Defense William Perry is advising that the U.S. and Russia both reduce nuclear weapons without a treaty, as a treaty would require ratification by Congress. This would allow Obama and his executive branch to unilaterally cut our nuclear weaponry and ignore the treaty clause of the Constitution.
As Bolton and Woo point out, the US has a greater global responsibility than Russia; Iran and North Korea, neither of which is far from Russian interests, can only be countered by U.S. military strength. In addition, they note that Russia is not a trustworthy partner in weapons reduction; it has violated many arms-control agreements, such as the 1991 Presidential Nuclear Initiatives.
Some of the inherent problems in the seizure by this executive branch of decision-making power is Barack Obama’s desire to deeply cut our nuclear forces. A joint decision with Russia would place long-term limits on our cache of arms, thus placing constraints on us catching up if Russia decides to go ahead and build and the blurring of the lines deliberately drawn by the Constitution’s Framers separating the executive and legislative branches power.
Obama has made no secret of his desire to dismantle our nuclear capacity; the New Start Treaty he championed in 2011 forced the U.S. to observe a ceiling of 700 strategic delivery vehicles and 1,550 strategic warheads, and this past March he stated his desire to cut our arsenal further:
“ … a step we have never taken before – reducing not only our strategic nuclear warheads but also tactical weapons and warheads in reserve.”
It is naïve to assume that Obama is simply blind to the results of his actions and trusts the world around him to act with generosity. There has been too much evidence of Russia’s support of Iran’s nuclear weapons program, and Russia has cunningly avoided supporting sanctions on North Korea for its rocket launches; in December, Georgy Toloraya, Director of Korean Research at the Institute of Economics, simply said:
“In Russia we believe that resolutions must be observed and UN decisions must be implemented. We think that North Korea has the right for space explorations but only after all the issues linked with the UN sanctions banning rocket launches with the use of ballistic technologies are settled. It is necessary to divide two aspects – we support the discussion of the rocket launch issue by the UN Security Council but we don’t think that this must automatically mean tougher sanctions against Pyongyang.”
Obama knows all this. His step-by-step evisceration of the United States is not confined to its economic system but its national defense as well.

I go a little further. I say that Obama is happy to wreck the US economy, because this will enable him to completely destroy US military defensive capability. This is the REAL agenda of the left. The people Obama has worked with his entire life.

Four more years of Obama may well bring America to the point of no return.

If Obama is allowed to realize the Davis/Palmer/Ayers/Dohrn vision of a militarily impotent America, Americans will be faced with two very harsh choices.

Lay down your arms and give up your sovereignty to a United Nations world superstate.

Or face the combined military might of Russia, China, Iran, North Korea, Cuba, Venezuela, Nicaragua, Vietnam, Cambodia, Laos, possibly Pakistan, Indonesia and Brazil, and several other countries… with hardly a friend in the world to come to your aid.

This won’t be a one or two front conflict. This will be a multi-polar, all out attack on the US homeland.

Americans need to wake up. And fast.

Putin to OK Adoption Cold War on US

uk.news.yahoo.com

Russian President Putin says he will sign a bill that bars Americans from adopting Russian children, despite criticism from US State Department officials, who say it would prevent unwanted kids from growing up in loving families.

Keep reading on Fox news >>

Russia and China Want to Help Obama Take Away American Guns

AlexJones

Outrageously, foreign governments are now chiming in to support the U.S. media bandwagon that is trying to undermine American's Constitutionally-protected 2nd Amendment rights.

The Communist Chinese government has now backed the disarming rhetoric of the globalist establishment in an article published by state-run media outlet Xinhua, advising that, "If Obama wants to take practical measures to control guns, he has to make preparation for a protracted war and considerable political cost."

Meanwhile, Russian media outlets including RT Moscow have reacted the Connecticut shooting by supporting calls for 'assault' weapon bans. Chiming in on the recent tragedy, Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev stated, "I totally agree with those who are against free arms circulation. This is my principled position." Medvedev further vowed to uphold the existing Russian gun ban.

Physicist: Obama Chosen By The Russians 20 Years Ago To Be POTUS

Birther Report:

68Truthseeker: Physicist claims he was told in 1992 'The USA will have a black, Soviet agent as president soon' Interview with Physicist Thomas Fife by Geopolitical Analyst, Jeff Nyquist. - Hat tip SA.

Pravda: Illiterate society reelected Obama

Birther Report: Excerpts Via Gina Miller @ Renew America

Throughout most of the twentieth century, the Pravda newspaper was roughly the Russian equivalent of our leftist, state-controlled "mainstream" media, publishing only regime-approved, Communist party line content. Since undergoing a change in ownership in the early 1990s, it now offers warnings against the communism that infected the former Soviet Union and caused the deaths of millions of Russian citizens.

Despite the warnings of history and those who have lived under its iron fist, communism has come to America, and the useful idiots who dumbly adore the Communist-in-Chief, Barack Obama (or whatever his name is), are gladly and stupidly drinking the kool-aid of ignorance in embracing that deadly and dead-end ideology. Even the Russians can see this!

I read with sad amazement a couple of columns in the new, non-communist Pravda online by Xavier Lerma. One is titled, "Obama's Soviet Mistake," and the other, "The Reason Obama is President." Mr. Lerma clearly understands the terrible place of tyranny America has chosen, and he knows the reasons why. The reason Obama is President is the same reason I have repeatedly declared here in my columns: America has turned away from God and to self-worship and fleeting, carnal pleasures.

In "The Reason Obama is President," Mr. Lerma writes, [...]

[...] Despite the election result numbers, I do not believe the ignorant people yet outnumber the informed in America, although most of the informed are of the older generations. The Left has election and voter fraud down to a science, and it may well be that conservatism will not be allowed to win major elections anymore. The reports of election fraud since November 6th are sickening, but it appears the Republicans are content to lie down and take it, while they go off on misguided, introspective tangents about what they should have done differently to get the women and minority votes. It is stupidity in motion. If the election numbers are fraudulent, then speculation on "why" we "lost" is dumb, because without the election fraud tacked on, it is likely that we didn't lose!

Regardless, it remains that we are now saddled with the Communist federal government we deserve. Those of us who know better have allowed our liberty to lapse under decades of incremental thefts of our freedoms by an ever-growing monster bureaucracy in Washington. We have ceded our freedom to our Republican and Democrat masters in DC. Can we ever get it back? Not without a return to God's principles found in the Bible. And, looking around at the younger members of our degenerate, ignorant society, I am not holding my breath that they will suddenly turn to the Lord, although a few of them will, as God has called and chosen them.

Nevertheless, we will continue to pray for our nation and fight to rid our government of the evil criminals — both Democrat and Republican — who have commandeered it.

CONTINUED HERE: http://www.renewamerica.com/columns/miller/121127 >>

Moscow Congratulates Obama and the "flexibility" that is coming

Trevor

 

Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev has congratulated US President Barack Obama on his re-election victory, while expressing relief that Moscow will not have to deal with the Republican challenger Mitt Romney.

From Kremlin propaganda station Russia Today:

“Congratulations!” Medvedev tweeted in English to Barack Obama, who emerged victorious in a tight race against Mitt Romney.
“Obama is an understandable and predictable partner,” Medvedev told reporters on Wednesday. “Obama has been a quite successful president.”
Meanwhile, the Russian premier expressed his relief that Republican candidate Mitt Romney, known for his anti-Russia outbursts on the campaign trail, had lost the election.
“I am glad that the man who calls Russia its No. 1 foe will not be the president of this large and influential state,” Medvedev said. “That is paranoid.”
Moscow and Washington, which declared a “reset” in relations in 2009, are working to overcome a number of bilateral hurdles, including the NATO missile defense system in Eastern Europe, which Russia views as a threat to its national security, as well as how to resolve the years-long Syrian conflict.
Dmitry Peskov, the Russian leader’s press secretary, told reporters that President Vladimir Putin has sent a congratulatory message to Barack Obama, together with an invitation to visit Moscow in 2013.

President Obama, who has worked with pro-Moscow, anti-US military activists such as Frank Marshall Davis, Alice Palmer and the Communist Party USA most of his life.

Now we will see the “flexibility” that Obama promised Mr. Medvedev in the infamous “hot mike” incident in Korea in March.

President Obama may be about to give Russia and its allies a potentially fatal advantage against their main target, the United States of America.

Obama cries “peace,” but he is leading the world to war. A war that Moscow and its allies in Beijing, Tehran, Havana, Pyongyang, Caracas, Managua and the caves of Afghanistan and Pakistan, have a very good chance of winning.

Moscow Expects President Obama to be “More Flexible” on Missile Defense Shield

It’s payoff time for Russia.

From The Washington Post:
Russia expects Barack Obama to show more flexibility in a dispute over U.S. missile defense plans in Europe following his re-election as president, a top official said Thursday…

In March, Obama, unaware that he was speaking on an open microphone, told Dmitry Medvedev, then Russia’s president, that he would have more flexibility on the issue after the November election.
Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Rogozin appeared to be trying to remind Obama of his promise when he said Thursday that Moscow hopes that the U.S. president will listen to Russia’s concerns about the U.S.-led NATO missile defense for Europe.
“We hope that President Obama after his re-election will be more flexible on the issue of taking into the account the opinions of Russia and others regarding a future configuration of NATO’s missile defense,” Rogozin told an international conference in Moscow.
Russia has urged the U.S. to provide guarantees that any future shield is not aimed against it and threatened to target elements of the U.S. shield with missiles itself if no agreement is reached.
U.S. promises to inform Moscow about details of the shield aren’t enough, Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov said Thursday, adding that Moscow will continue pushing for firm guarantees from Washington…
The Kremlin greeted Obama’s re-election enthusiastically… Putin wrote Obama a telegram expressing hope that the two countries’ relations would improve further and inviting Obama to visit Russia next year.
Referring to comments that Republican challenger Mitt Romney had made during the campaign, Medvedev said he was “happy that the man who considers Russia (its) No. 1 geopolitical foe won’t be the president of this very large and important country.”
Former Russian Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov said he hoped that being on a second term will allow Obama to focus more on relations with Russia than Romney would have with his first term.

Four more years of Obama “flexibility” and defense cuts, will leave the US military in ruins and unable to defend US allies, or even the US homeland, from Russia, China, Iran and their allies.

At that point US sovereignty, and even physical survival, will be in serious question.

Is that the plan?

US charges 11 Russians with conspiracy to export high-tech electronics

RussiaToday

The Russian Air Force Can See Sarah Palin’s House from their Bear Bombers

A Time For Choosing/ Whitney Pitcher

In the past month, Russian bombers have twice been involved in arctic war games near U.S. airspace around Alaska. The first time began on the same day as a meeting between President Obama and Russian Prime Minister, Vladimir Putin, on June 18th and continued until June 25^th. An article at the Free Beacon notes that two key Alaskan sites may be potential targets in exercise—the missile defense base at Ft. Greely and the Trans Alaska pipeline which is responsible for transporting about 11% of America’s oil.

The article later goes on to quote  Retired Air Force Lt. Gen. Thomas McInerney, a former Alaska North American Aerospace Defense commander:

“The Russians continue to exercise our air defense identification zone, which shows Mr. Putin loves to let President Obama know that they still have global capability,” McInerney said in an interview. “So much for reset.”
McInerney also said the Obama administration kept the encounter between the bombers and U.S. fighters secret because “they obviously don’t want the world to know that the exercise was done deliberately to coincide with the Obama-Putin summit.”

The Free Beacon article also notes that similar exercises were performed by the Russian Air Force in 2007. An article at the American Enterprise Institute notes the same as well (emphasis mine):

Just as concerning as Russia’s building of a new bomber is its eagerness to flaunt its old ones. Since 2007, Russia’s Air Force has increased the number of exercises it conducts near U.S. air space around Alaska, and according to Bill Gertz, American and Canadian Air Force fighters intercepted two Russian bombers that crossed into the U.S.’s 200-mile air defense identification zone around Alaska on July 4. Prior to this, Russian war games held in the same area in mid-June included 30 bombers, and may have been designed to test cruise missile attacks on U.S. missile defense facilities.

The AEI article notes that a new Russian bomber will be ready 5 years earlier than anticipated and references the second time that the Russian Air Force came near Alaskan air space on July 4^th in what a U.S. Defense official called “Putin’s Fourth of July Bear greeting to Obama”.

Governor Palin shared the Free Beacon article on her Facebook page a couple weeks ago, noting:

On the campaign trail four years ago I talked about Alaska’s strategic location on the globe, the potential for future conflicts over arctic transportation lanes and resources, and the crucial need to keep our eye on Putin’s activities. Later I spoke out against Obama’s egregious decision to cut back Alaska’s missile defense systems. Please take a look at this article about Russia’s arctic war game exercises earlier this month. This shouldn’t be a surprise to anyone who was paying attention four years ago. Maybe now we should ask the President if this is what “more flexibility” means.

Indeed. Governor Palin took office in December of 2006. When Russia began to increase their exercises in 2007, she was in office.  So while she was mocked for saying that Putin “rears his head” in Alaska air space during her interview with the Perky One during the 2008 campaign, she was privy to that defense information regarding Russia’s arctic war exercise starting in 2007. In fact, the Alaska Air National Guard was recognized as an Air Force Outstanding Unit in March of 2008 in part because they “maintained North American air sovereignty by detecting, monitoring and escorting 22 Russian bombers from within its area of operations”. Who was the commander-in-chief of the Alaska Air National Guard at that time? Governor Palin.

More >>

Russia threatens preemptive strike over planned US missile shield

Read >>

Russia rages after US jails notorious arms dealer

 

Narong Sangnak / EPA, file

Russia is furious over a 25-year prison sentence imposed on arms dealer Viktor Bout -- seen inside a cell at the criminal court in Bangkok, Thailand -- by a court in the U.S.

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

Read >>

The Kremlin Was Warned 20 Years Ago To Not Appoint Putin To Any Government Positions

The Russian government was warned 20 years ago not to appoint Vladimir Putin to "any other positions" because he was accused in a corruption scandal as a public official in St. Petersburg, The Telegraph reports.

Hundreds of scanned letters and papers to this effect were published on Facebook on Tuesday by friends of Marina Salye, a former member of St Petersburg city council who launched an inquiry into Putin's office in the early 1990s, and who died earlier this month at the age of 77.

Salye's documents suggest that Putin, then head of St Petersburg's committee for foreign relations, issued permits to Russian companies export raw materials abroad for meat, fruit, sugar, and other produce, because the city was facing severe food shortages. But although $100 million worth of goods were sent from Russia, no food was delivered in exchange.

Putin has always denied any wrongdoing.

The archive published online includes a letter from Russia's chief state inspector warning that Putin could be removed from his post in St Petersburg because of the alleged corruption, and telling the federal government not to appoint Putin "to any other positions" until the case was examined.

While the city council passed a resolution to sack Putin, St Petersburg’s mayor refused to do so. Instead, he promoted him to be his deputy, and no investigation was carried out. The rest, as they say, is history.

Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/kremlin-warned-putin-st-petersburg-marina-salye-2012-3?utm_source=inpost&utm_medium=seealso&utm_term=&utm_content=1&utm_campaign=recirc#ixzz1r58fi0Iz

FBI: Russian Honey Trap Anna Chapman Was 'Close' To Seducing An Obama Cabinet Official

The bizarre saga of Anna Chapman, the smoking hot Russian spy arrested in New York in 2010, just got a lot weirder.

In a new interview with the BBC, the FBI's counterintelligence chief Frank Figliuzzi revealed that the real reason the feds arrested Chapman was because top officials believed she was getting "closer and closer" to seducing a sitting U.S. Cabinet member. 

Figliuzzi told the BBC that Chapman got "closer and closer to higher and higher ranking leadership ... she got close enough to disturb us." 

"We were becoming very concerned," he said, according to The Independent. "They were getting close enough to a sitting US cabinet member that we thought we could no longer allow this to continue."

Unfortunately, Figliuzzi would not name the senior U.S. official who Chapman tried to seduce. But here's a look at the Obama Cabinet, just for fun. 

h/t Wired

Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/fbi-russian-honey-trap-anna-chapman-was-close-to-seducing-an-obama-cabinet-official-2012-4?nr_email_referer=1&utm_source=Triggermail&utm_medium=email&utm_term=Politix%20Select&utm_campaign=Politix%20Select%202012-04-04#ixzz1r57iUGHx

FROM GBTV: IS OBAMA SELLING OUT AMERICA TO RUSSIA?

Tiffany Gabbay

At worst, Russia has historically been America’s arch nemesis, at best, it has been the country’s ongoing strategic and ideological opponent. Yet, despite millennia of cultural contributions and “fundamentally transforming” since the fall of Communism, many wonder just how “free” a nation Russia really is.

Take into account the staggering number of members of the press who have been killed under the stewardship of past and incoming President Vladimir Putin. To date, the toll falls at over 40. In the words of Observer journalist Peter Preston: ”He [Putin] is elected time and again. Yet a free press seems to mean pitifully little to him. You investigate? You report? You die, unavenged.”  More >>

All the Pravda [Obama-Medvedev affair]

CFP/  Daniel Greenfield

For a man so in love with the technology of image, the camera, the microphone and the teleprompter, the leader of the increasingly less free world has a natural tendency to put a little too much faith in it. This is the second time that an open microphone has let Obama down, the first time it recorded him stabbing an ally in the back, the second time it recorded him stabbing a few dozen more in the back.

Medvedev, whose bosom buddy just managed to cling to power with a stolen election and brutal suppression of protests, surely understands how O feels. Photo ops with tigers and sunken treasures, not to mention skiing, martial arts and even rap, did not keep the Big P in smooth with the Russian public when the economy headed south.

Vladimir Putin didn’t have any racial guilt to ladle on the voters that might get them to overlook the mansions, the corruption and the abuses of power. But the average American voter, like the Russian voter, is more interested in the meat and potatoes, not to mention the gasoline, than in mystical allusions to the power of history. If Putin at times seemed bent on passing himself off as a new czar and Obama as a new savior, the crown and halo were shattered by the economy.

Putin’s had tightened control over Russia to an extent that the Obamas and the Warrens could only fondly dream of in their fondest federalist fantasies. And it’s easier to steal elections, when you don’t have to kowtow to a bunch of provincial interests and take the complaints of bible and gun owners seriously. But much like Putin and Ahmadinejad, Obama enjoys dim prospects in a straight election. And unlike them, he doesn’t have a military force that will turn up a few million ballots and send the protesters straight to the hospital, if not to the morgue.

Obama likes being a democrat, it’s just the democracy part that he doesn’t much care for

Obama likes being a democrat, it’s just the democracy part that he doesn’t much care for. And while his diplomacy is generally underwhelming, a mutual dislike of elections proved to be a popular bonding topic with Medvedev, the human face of the regime. But if Medvedev really thought that Obama was serious about needing more space because of an election, he hasn’t been paying much attention to American politics.

This is a White House that doesn’t pass laws to curry favor with the general voting population. That’s what publicity stunts and race cards and wars against women are for. In 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, where Al Sharpton is an honored guest and policy is outsourced to whoever comes earliest and tosses the foam ball the best, policy isn’t made to soothe the savage electoral beast, it’s done to pay off buddies, soothe furious Muslims and implement whatever idea that a committee of unhinged leftists, Clinton veterans and friends from Chicago think is the way to go. 

If Obama is jettisoning Eastern Europe, it’s because he thinks it doesn’t matter. The sage wisdom is that the future is in the Middle East and the Pacific Rim. Russia is full of pale men and so is Eastern Europe. A man who thinks that there’s a language known as “Austrian” can’t exactly be expected to tell them apart or to care. Not when there are more exciting places to be, like Beijing of Dubai.

When it comes to Russia, Obama can’t see the point. When the Berlin Wall fell, Obama was busy completing the final leg of his prolonged education and adolescence while minoring in racial careerism. If he was even busy paying attention to people with funny names like Yeltsin or Gorbachev, it was while smoking blunts and laughing at how funny the syllables of their names sounded in his mouth.   More >>

Obama begs Medvedev for 'space' - caught on mic

Is Obama planning to let Russia help re-elect him to his 2nd Term

WND/ by Aaron Klein

What specifically was President Obama referring to when he told Russian President Dmitri Medvedev he would have “more flexibility” after the November election to deal with controversial issues such as missile defense?

In remarks caught on mic and later broadcast around the world, Obama asked Medvedev to tell incoming Russian President Vladimir Putin to give him more “space,” indicating missile issues can be resolved during a second term in office.

Obama made the remarks in a bilateral meeting at the Nuclear Security Summit in Seoul.

Find out more about Barack Obama’s radical past in Aaron Klein’s “Red Army: The Radical Network that must be defeated to save America,” available at WND’s Superstore

Stated Obama: “On all these issues, but particularly missile defense, this, this can be solved, but it’s important for him to give me space.”

Medvedev replied: “Yeah, I understand. I understand your message about space. Space for you. …”

Obama then stated: “This is my last election. After my election, I have more flexibility.”

Last year, Obama committed to reducing stocks of U.S. weapons-grade plutonium and signed an agreement that will lower the country’s deployed nuclear arsenals.

Obama’s “science czar,” John Holdren, long petitioned for the moves in a magazine whose personnel were used for the benefit of Soviet propaganda in an attempt to disarm America, according to a former top intelligence official during the Soviet era.

The magazine’s founders were accused of providing vital nuclear secrets that helped the Soviets develop an atomic bomb.

The magazine, the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, has been urging the U.S. to surrender its nuclear arsenal to international control.

In April 2010, the U.S. and Russia signed a deal reducing stocks of weapons-grade plutonium, officials in both nations said at the time.

U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov signed a non-binding protocol to a 2000 agreement on eliminating excess weapons-grade plutonium from defense programs.

U.S. officials have said each country is to dispose of 34 metric tons of weapons-grade plutonium by burning it in reactors.

One week earlier, Medvedev and Obama signed the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty, or START, committing them to reducing their deployed nuclear arsenals.

The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, with Holdren on the board of directors from 1984 until recently, has long petitioned for the U.S. to reduce its nuclear stockpiles. According to Pavel Sudoplatov, a former major-general in Soviet intelligence, this kind of work by the magazine editors was for the benefit of the Soviet Union.

Holdren is assistant to the president for science and technology, director of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy and co-chairman of the President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology.

The Bulletin of Atomic Scientists began publishing regularly in 1945, when it was founded by former physicists from the Manhattan Project, which developed the first atomic bomb.

Two of the magazine’s founding sponsors, Leo Szilard and Robert Oppenheimer, were accused of passing information from the Manhattan Project to the Soviets. Both were also key initiators of the Manhattan Project.

In 1994, Sudoplatov, a former major-general in Soviet intelligence, identified Szilard and Oppenheimer as key sources of crucial atomic information to the Soviet Union.

“The most vital information for developing the first Soviet atomic bomb came from scientists engaged in the Manhattan Project to build the American atomic bomb – Robert Oppenheimer, Enrico Fermi and Leo Szilard,” wrote Sudoplatov.

Sudoplatov wrote the Soviet Union “received reports on the progress of the Manhattan Project from Oppenheimer and his friends in oral form, through comments and asides, and from documents transferred through clandestine methods with their full knowledge that the information they were sharing would be passed on.”

Oppenheimer was accused in Senate hearings of bringing communists into the Manhattan Project. He brought his brother Frank and three former graduate students into the project, all of whom, according to Senate hearings, were well known to him to be “members of the Communist Party or closely associated with activities of the Communist Party.”

Oppenheimer admitted he knew by August 1943 that two of the scientists working under him were Communist Party members. Three of five scientists under Oppenheimer’s direct supervision were accused of leaking secret information about the atomic bomb to the Soviets.

On Oct. 25, 1945, Oppenheimer met with President Truman at the White House, urging him to surrender the U.S. nuclear monopoly to international control. Truman was outraged, reportedly telling Secretary of State Dean Acheson, “I don’t want to see that son-of-a-b*tch in this office ever again.”  More >>

Pravda accuses U.S. press of 'deliberately hiding evidence' of Obama's 'fraud'

It's a twist of irony: The Russian news website Pravda has published an accusation that the American media is "tame," afraid to publish news and is "deliberately hiding the evidence published on the Internet about [President Obama's] defrauding of the American public and the deliberate evisceration of the Constitution of the United States." Read more on WND.com. >>

Conspiracy-Did a U.S. Radar Research Station Disable Russia's Phobos Probe?

Scientific American/ By Jim Nash

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HF ANTENNA ARRAY: A retired commander of Russia's ballistic missile early warning system implied that the U.S.'s High Frequency Active Auroral Research Program (HAARP) observatory in Alaska interfered with the Mars-bound Phobos-Grunt probe. HAARP is often a target of conspiracy theorists. Image: Courtesy of the High Frequency Active Auroral Research Program (HAARP)

After 19 attempts over 51 years, Russia has yet to chalk up a fully successful mission to Mars. That includes its ambitious Phobos–Grunt probe, launched November 8 from Kazakhstan and now stranded in low Earth orbit. Unable to regain control of the spacecraft, the Russians now expect it to fall back to Earth around January 9.

Responding to shame over the nation's Mars program, Russian President Dmitry Medvedev has threatened to criminally prosecute those responsible if possible. Soon after Medvedev's comments, a former high-ranking Russian officer found a more convenient scapegoat in a remote Alaskan radar facility. But an analysis of the timing and physics involved shows that there is little basis for the claim.

Phobos–Grunt was to retrieve soil ("grunt" in Russian) from the Martian moon Phobos and return it to Earth for study. But the rocket engine intended to boost the spacecraft into a higher orbit failed. The probe itself has since communicated only sporadically with ground stations, and even then it has murmured only unintelligible noise.

To Lt. Gen. Nikolay Rodionov, a retired commander of Russia's ballistic missile early warning system, U.S. technology could have caused the rocket malfunction. In a November 24 interview with the Russian news agency Interfax, Rodionov said "powerful American radars" in Alaska "could have influenced the control systems of our interplanetary rover."

Rodionov was quoted saying the U.S. wants to use the ionosphere as part of its missile defense, although he did not elaborate. A subsequent article in India's The Hindu expanded on Rodionov's statement, indicating that he was likely referring to the U.S.'s High Frequency Active Auroral Research Program (HAARP) observatory established in 1993.