Exclusively in the new print issue of CounterPunch
HOLLYWOOD AND THE CIA — Film historian Ed Rampell details Hollywood’s entangled relationship with the CIA and the Pentagon; HOUSES OF THE DEAD: Nancy Kurshan exposes the cruel human rights offenses taking place inside America’s vast gulag of Control Unit Prisons; BROTHERHOOD OF SUMMER: David Macaray charts the history of the most powerful union in the US: the Baseball Players Association; TAR SANDS COME TO AMERICA: Steve Horn explains how the Keystone Pipeline debates have diverted attention from Big Oil’s other plans to transport Alberta’s oil into the US. PLUS: Jeffrey St. Clair on CONSTITUTIONAL ENTROPY; Mike Whitney on HOW THE BANKS TARGETED BLACKS; Chris Floyd on THE RISE OF BRITAIN’S TEA PARTY; Kristin Kolb on THE NEEDLE AND THE DAMAGE DONE; Kim Nicolini on the FILMS OF WILLIAM FRIEDKIN; and Lee Ballinger on POETS VS. THE ONE PERCENT.
Archives by Tag 'Russia'
Russians’ love for vodka has a long history. Legend holds that vodka arrived in Moscow in the 14th century, brought by Genovese merchants to Prince Dmitry Ivanovich. Legend also says that monk Isidore, who lived in the Chudov Monastery, inside the Kremlin, made a recipe...
London.
When I lived in Moscow, occasionally Russians would fix me with a stern gaze and gravely pose the question ‘who won the war?’ Circumspectly, I would answer that Russia had without doubt borne the principal burden of vanquishing Nazi Germany. ...
A cruel and heart-rending civil war rages in Syria, and this tragedy is fueling a heated political debate in the rest of the world between interventionists (whether sincere R2P humanitarians, or opportunistic imperialists) and non-interventionists.
Syrians opposed ...
Recent remarks by Carla Del Ponte, a Swiss investigator of the UN Independent Commission of Inquiry, have changed the nature of debate on the use of chemical weapons in Syria’s civil war. Momentum had been building up for months against Bashar al-Assad’s government, ...
Russia’s Duma Deputy Ilya Ponomaryov once said, “To steal one ruble, it is first necessary to spend nine inefficiently.” That slogan should adorn the entrance to the Skolkovo technology park as its official motto.
Scientists and scholars predi...
When the huge immigration wave from the Soviet Union arrived in 1990, we were glad.
First of all, because we believe that all immigration is a good thing for the country. This, I believe, is generally the case.
Second, because we were convinced that this spe...
Dalarna, Sweden
“Will there be war?” (”Kommer det bli krig?”) was the question posed in the 22 April report by the one of country’s most respected papers, Svenska Dagbladet (SvD), its article revealing some alleged particulars of a Russi...
New details emerge every day, raising more questions. But the outlines of the stomach-churning story seem clear. Two young men, brothers who emigrated from Kyrgyzstan twelve years ago with their parents and sisters—high-achieving, “well-assimilated” immigrant me...
Things seemed to have calmed on the Korean peninsula for now. This despite the fact that the U.S. and South Korea are continuing their outrageously provocative Foal Eagle “war games” through April 30. The Foal Eagle is one of the ...
“The pot calls the kettle black.”
–Cervantes, Don Quixote de la Mancha
The magic number is 18. That is the number each country has selected to express its disapproval of the actions of the other. Vladim...
Nicosia.
The municipal theatre of Nicosia sits directly behind the Cypriot parliament. Its prominence within the capital suggests the importance of such civic buildings to a population seeing itself as the inheritors to the grand heritage of Greek traditio...
To the many crimes of President Vladimir Putin, a new one was added last month: kicking babies, sweet, innocent, plump babies — out of sheer wickedness. This crime was discussed ad nauseam, until it became a meme which was ...
Back in 1954 François Truffaut coined the term auteur (the French word for author) to describe how certain directors shape their films according to a unique creative vision. According to auteur theory, directors such as Akira Kurosawa, Satyajit Ray, Alfred Hitchco...
What will a man do to avoid tax? Become Russian for one, or the cultural ambassador for Montenegro, the prelude to obtaining another means of escaping the homeland’s rapacious tax regime. France’s Gérard Depardieu, having failed to teleport himself via a spaceship ...
With its power declining, Washington was not able any longer to keep Russia out of the World Trade Organization. Congress showed its spite over its impotence by hooking the normalizing of trade with Russia to what is called the “...
I drove up to white and sumptuous Livadia Palace with some difficulty. The palace, once a royal summer residence built and frequented by the last Russian Tsar, stands on a rather steep slope amidst a spacious park that descends to the Black Sea far below, and the road is ...
We have arrived at a historical moment of economic crisis where no exit appears visible. The limits of financialization and the “service” economy have been reached. The way forward is through a return to developing the real economy. However, we are also at the limit...
Two years ago Turkey was on its way to being a player in Central Asia, a major power broker in the Middle East, and a force in international politics. It had stepped in to avoid a major escalation of the 2008 war between Georgia and Russia by blocking U.S. ships from ente...
Istanbul.
The heavy loaded cargo boats, passenger liners, cruise ships and plentiful ferries packed with tourists steam by the Maiden Tower rising from the black rock amid lucid waters; they gingerly make their way past the mountain-like mosques on the mai...
“No one is forgotten and nothing is forgotten”. That is what is engraved in Gold on the granite stone, right behind the statue of the Motherland, spreading her arms in grief.
The Piskariovskoye Memorial Cemetery is in the city of St. Petersburg –186 mass grav...
In the Middle Eastern corrida, the moment of truth is approaching fast. Assad’s Syria is running around the arena like a wounded bull, fraught and worn down by a year of cruel strife. Banderillas of mujaheeds stick out of his broken hide. The public, the Europeans, the ...
Angered by the non-stop, one-sided propaganda on CNN and BBC World, usually a prelude to NATO bombing campaigns (including the six-month onslaught on Libya, the casualties of which are still hidden from the public) or direct occupations, I was asked to explain my views on...
The members of the Russian punk rock (some prefer to call it porn) band Pussy Riot await the out come of their appeals after being sentenced to two years imprisonment for their song “Mother God, drive Putin out”. It wasn’t that they sung it, so much as where there...
A new film, “Compliance,” examines “the human desire to follow and obey autho...
Paris.
Once upon a time there was an organization called Amnesty International which was dedicated to defending prisoners of conscience all over the world. Its action was marked by two principles that contributed to its success: neutrality and discretion....