BLOG Post #333: Crimes of War 13 Apr 202211 Apr 2022 The audio version is at https://www.podserve.fm/episodes/56499/42-crimes-of-war.mp3 Mass Violence in Our Times In just the past few years, we have witnessed mass violence directed at innocent people in many places: China’s…
BLOG Post #331: When Will It End, and How? 30 Mar 202229 Mar 2022 The podcast of this blog is at https://www.podserve.fm/episodes/55380/40-when-will-it-end-and-how.mp3 How will it end? In the wake of Ukraine’s stunning and stubborn resistance to Putin’s invasion, the question whose answer once seemed…
BLOG Post #292: the Navalny case and US-Russia relations 21 Mar 202121 Mar 2021 (Note to Readers: This blog is the long version of my "Global Citizen" broadcast #4, which will be available March 23.) Joe Biden has barely had time to get reacquainted…
BLOG Post #267: In China, Your DNA Belongs to the State 7 Jul 202019 Jul 2020 The roundup and incarceration of hundreds of thousands of people of a specific ethnic or religious group has all too many precedents in modern history. The fact that the group…
BLOG Post #263: Donald Trump’s Stealth Attack on America 2 Jun 20201 Jun 2020 Donald Trump has made the calculated decision to let the pandemic play out without need of a federal plan for disease treatment and economic recovery. Over 100,000 deaths mean nothing…
BLOG Post #225: Trump’s Crusade in Latin America 28 Jan 201927 Jan 2019 What we are witnessing in Venezuela is a Latin America policy that draws from the Cold War and the era of US interventions, when regard for democracy and international law…
BLOG Post #211: At Home and Abroad, Trump Abandons Human Rights (Part 2) 16 Jul 201814 Jul 2018 (Note: This is the continuation of Post #210, published July 7. The full version is available in The Asia-Pacific Journal/Japan Focus, https://apjjf.org/2018/15/Gurtov.html. Deceptive Reporting Discussion in the Trump administration of…
BLOG Post #210: At Home and Abroad, Trump Abandons Human Rights (Part 1) 7 Jul 20187 Jul 2018 In January 1941, with the prospect looming of US involvement in another European war, President Franklin Roosevelt spoke of America’s purpose in the world: to protect and promote “four freedoms.”…
BLOG Post #152: While Our Attention is Elsewhere, Climate Change Worsens 27 Feb 201727 Feb 2017 Donald Trump’s presidency has gotten so much attention that the latest threats to climate stability have received only passing notice. To be sure, Trump’s belief that climate change is a…
BLOG… Post #121: Unintended Consequences and the Warfare State 7 Jul 201627 Feb 2017 “The danger is, as ever with these things, unintended consequences.” So wrote Prime Minister Tony Blair to President George W. Bush in 2002, as Bush prepared to invade Iraq (https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/worldviews/wp/2016/07/06/full-text-annotated-tony-blairs-2002-iraq-memo-to-george-bush). …
BLOG… Post #119 – Too Close for Comfort: The Dangerous US-China Maritime Dispute 11 Jun 201627 Feb 2017 The Background Two recent close encounters between US spy planes and Chinese jets spell trouble for relations between Washington and Beijing. The first occurred over the South China Sea…
American Politics and the World… Post #118: Cowgirl Diplomacy? Foreign Policy Under Hillary Clinton 24 May 201627 Feb 2017 America’s mainstream media, ever attracted to the splashy rather than the serious, has a new topic to occupy the time until Election Day: President Trump. What will he do first? …