Fragments of a blog
Fragments of a blog
The German terms Cäsarenwahn and Cäsarenwahnsinn gained some currency in the second half of the 19th century thanks to a novel by Gustav Freytag, a psychiatric treatise by Friedrich Wiedermeister, and a historical study by Ludwig Quidde. In the last…
Streetwise Professor (Craig Pirrong) explained spoofing on electronic exchanges in this post three years ago. Yesterday, he wrote about the US Department of Justice (DOJ) indicting a group of traders for alleged spoofing. The stunning part of the indictment is…
Gary Saul Morson has a wonderful article in The Weekly Standard: …Russian “populism” (narodnichestvo, from narod, the people) began in the 1870s… The importance of Russian populism lies less in its programs than in its ethos, a guilty idealism… Jolting…
Corey Robin writes on his blog: …close watchers of Russia and the US have pointed out all the multiple ways in which the US is currently pursuing a very anti-Russia foreign policy, more aggressive than anything pursued by Obama (especially…
Yesterday’s World Cup final was interesting in more ways than one: Protest group Pussy Riot, long a thorn in Vladimir Putin’s side, claimed responsibility Sunday for four people who brought the World Cup final to a brief halt by running…
Reuters reported from Moscow on Thursday: Russian police briefly detained veteran British campaigner Peter Tatchell in Moscow on Thursday after he attempted to hold a one-man protest near the Kremlin in support of gay rights on the first day of…
Yesterday, AP reported from Moscow: Russians angered by the impending inauguration of Vladimir Putin to a new term as president protested Saturday in scores of cities across the country — and police responded by reportedly arresting nearly 1,600 of them.…
According to Bloomberg, President Trump tweeted this statement early Monday morning: Russia and China are playing the Currency Devaluation game as the U.S. keeps raising interest rates. Not acceptable! For decades, China has been intermittently accused of keeping the yuan…
Why would Bashar Assad order the chemical attack in eastern Ghouta? I’ve come across a helpful counterquestion asked by someone in the Russian-speaking parts of the web: And why did Mikhail Tukhachevsky use poison gas against the Tambov insurgents in…
The latest from the US Treasury: The U.S. Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC), in consultation with the Department of State, today designated seven Russian oligarchs and 12 companies they own or control, 17 senior Russian…
Johnny Cash sang this at Folsom Prison 50 years ago: Yes, they’re hanging Joe Bean this morningfor a shooting that he never did.He killed twenty men by the time he was ten –he was an unruly kid. It might be…
Two extracts from 20th-century Russian classics in lieu of commentary to Thursday’s State of the Federation address. “What the hell are you trying to get out of me?” “The same thing that my childhood friend, Kolya Osten-Baken, wanted to get…