Fragments of a blog
Fragments of a blog
Sergei Dovlatov once remarked: “In Soviet newspapers, only misprints are truthful.” His first example was gavnokomanduyushchiy instead of glavnokomanduyushchiy — “Commander-in-Shit” for “Commander-in-Chief,” roughly speaking. Dovlatov did not live to witness the spread of spell checkers and autocorrectors. We’re all…
When Trump visited Moscow in 1987, he did some preliminary probing for a possible real estate deal but came back disappointed: the USSR had no private ownership of land at all and the dispute resolution procedure his Soviet counterparts proposed…
From a conversation with Edward Luttwak published by the Wall Street Journal in March 2020: Ranching has been more than an investment. It has helped him understand the fundamental weakness of post-Soviet Russia. “Between Vladivostok and the North Korean border,…
Simon Saradzhyan has published a long article on the 2020 Karabakh war in The Moscow Times and uploaded an unabridged version of it to his site. I would suggest reading it after or alongside Mark Galeotti’s earlier piece while keeping…
A nurse in South Dakota says some of her patients refuse to believe they are infected with Covid-19 until their dying breath – literally. Some would rather be told they had the flu, pneumonia, even lung cancer (!) – anything…
Mark Galeotti in the Moscow Times: its [the Kremlin’s] inability and seeming unwillingness to control this six-week war had become increasingly problematic, especially as Armenia… was suffering attacks even on its own territory. This was all the more serious given…
The latest from Armenia: Russian peacekeepers have departed for Nagorno-Karabakh after Moscow brokered a peace deal that sparked celebrations in Azerbaijan and protests in Armenia, where demonstrators briefly occupied government buildings. The truce, announced late on Monday night, calls for…
Looking at the list of heads of states who have congratulated Joe Biden on his win, and at the list of those who have refused to do so or kept silent, it’s pretty clear that Biden has emerged as the…
Up until recently, Putin’s regime committed fraud at every important election. It wasn’t that easy, even though the perpetrators were told they would never face prosecution. In fact, having independent or opposition party observers at polling stations all but closed…
Once I had great – inflated – hopes for Trump. I was disappointed by Obama’s reluctance to actively resist the Kremlin’s aggression. Obama’s 2014 sanctions, I thought, were inadequate, even counterproductive. It would have been natural for Trump – it…
Four and a half years ago, there was a brief outbreak of fighting in Nagorny Karabakh. It had been waiting to happen, I said then, as Azerbaijan had been investing its oil revenues in rearmament and was ready to strike.…
Looking for an example of a Constructivist building that would be clearly pre- and non-Brutalist, I’ve stumbled on a half-ruined structure remarkable for reasons not limited to architecture. Actually, it was by coincidence that I spotted it – here’s the…